


can't see the forest for the trees

by monstermash



Series: memento mori (remember, you will die) [8]
Category: Far Cry (Video Games), Far Cry 5
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Firewatch, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-29
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-05-30 08:37:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 28,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15093143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monstermash/pseuds/monstermash
Summary: “So, what’s wrong with you?”The question throws John for a loop and he pauses for a moment to make sure he heard right. “Excuse me?”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> another au because i procrastinate writing by doing more writing
> 
> so this is a firewatch au, because that was a pretty good game and i figured why not. in this au there's no cult (obviously) and the Seeds have mostly worked out their own issues, though that isn't to say they have none whatsoever. but then again they don't really make an appearance except for John, who has for the most part worked through a lot of his issues in a mostly healthy way though he's still John so that doesn't really say much lmao.
> 
> also, i just wanted to write something where John and Garrett don't immediately start off on an antagonistic note with each other.
> 
> a good portion of the dialogue is from the game, mostly because i feel like a lot of it fits this version of John and Garrett, though there are some changes and dialogue that isn't from the game itself.

There’s a reason John absolutely hates being out in nature and it’s mostly all the hiking.

And man oh man, he is not looking forward to the two day hike to his assigned watchtower. He sits in the old truck Jacob loaned him and contemplates just turning around right then and there, give this whole thing up as a lost cause. But then he remembers the look on his brothers’ and niece’s faces when he woke up in the hospital, remembers what he promised them. So he grabs his rucksack and gets out of the truck, making sure the doors are locked before setting out on the well-worn trail into the forest.

Following the trail, listening to the sounds of the forest, it reminds John of the few times, years and years ago when they were still kids, when Jacob would pack up some of their things and some food and take them camping.

Of course he knows now that it wasn’t really camping. It was just Jacob keeping them safe from their violent father when he was too far gone, even for Jacob to deal with. They’d stay in their tent made out of blue tarps and old blankets that no one would miss, stolen from neighbor’s clotheslines. No more than three days at a time when they had to retreat to the small patch of woods behind the house and then Jacob would go and check if their father had calmed down or if he needed to steal some more food from the pantry.

Looking back on it, Jacob sacrificed a lot for him and Joseph over the years, to make sure they were kept as safe as possible. Thinking of it now, John realizes that Jacob is still sacrificing for both of them. More so for John than Joseph right now. All because John just couldn’t fucking stop himself and the shame of it all burns his ears.

Adjusting his rucksack, John pushes all thoughts from his mind and just focuses on putting one foot in front of the other.

He’ll have all summer here in Hope County, Montana to reflect on himself and his choices while keeping an eye out for any fires threatening to destroy the Whitetail Mountains.

\---

John makes it to his assigned watchtower on the night of the second day out in the forest, full moon high in the sky. He’s kind of dreading having to walk up all those stairs after two days of hiking, but the sooner he gets up there the sooner he can sleep on an actual bed.

The stairs creak, but mostly from age and use, the kind you would hear in old houses. Not the kind of creaking that means you’re about to fall right through broken and splintered wood. He stops about halfway up when he notices old, faded drawings on the handrail; it looks childlike and he can’t quite make out what it might’ve been originally, too worn away from time and weather. The scribbles make him think briefly of his niece, who resembles her mom more than Joseph, reminds him of the utter exasperation she’d look at him with whenever she got him to draw with her.

_(“Uncle Johnny that’s not what a horse looks like.”)_

There’s a quirk to the corners of his mouth, a half smile as he gets lost in his memories of his family, briefly brushes a thumb over the faded scribbles on the railing before continuing his way up the stairs.

The view from up top when he finally gets up there is amazing, seeing the vast forest bathed in the moonlight, as far as the eye can see, but he’s far too tired to fully appreciate it right now.

 _Got the whole summer to appreciate it and to reflect,_ he reminds himself as he turns away from the view and towards the small watchtower room. All the windows are boarded up – he’s going to have to take those down at some point, but that can wait – and the door is unlocked; the other watchtower was probably by recently make sure the place was mostly clean and stocked up and that the power was still working. John switches on the power as he swings his bag off of his back, leaving it by the cot in the corner and starts looking around for the radio.

That had been part of the instructions he’d been given before coming all the way out here; check in with the other tower as soon as possible.

As soon as he picks it up the radio crackles to life and the other tower calls him before John can even press down on the call button.

“Hey there, Two Forks Tower.”

He doesn’t recognize the voice, but then again, he shouldn’t have expected to, even if the guy on the other end is a friend of a friend of Jacob’s.

“Um, hello? Whoever this is?” John responds as he begins to look around the room that’s going to be his home for the next few months. There’s some boxes laying here and there, obviously taken out of storage recently.

“It’s John, right? I’m Garrett,” the voice – Garrett – tells him and there’s a small spark of recognition in John’s mind.

“Right, that’s what the guy said on the phone,” John answers as he gathers up all the pine cones that litter the room to be tossed out. Must’ve actually been longer since the place was actually checked on or maybe Garrett didn’t notice them or something. Maybe a weirdo hiker found the place and just left them. Anything’s possible, it’s not like the door was locked.

“So, what’s wrong with you?”

The question throws John for a loop and he pauses for a moment to make sure he heard right. “Excuse me?”

There’s a small amused huff from Garrett.

“People take this job to get away from something. So what’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong with you?” John asks back, a little too quickly. He doesn’t want to talk about it, talk about what happened. The pity he got from his family was bad enough, he doesn’t want it from some stranger too.

“Oh, that’s a great idea. Go ahead.” Either Garrett didn’t hear the slight defensive tone in John’s voice or he just didn’t care (or maybe he did and is trying to smooth things over, a small part of his mind suggests).

John pinches the bridge of his nose, trying to calm himself down. He’s tired and wants to sleep and he knows it’d be a bad idea to piss off the only person he’ll be interacting with on a regular basis out here. Sure, it’s only over radio, but still.

“Look, I just hiked for two days so I don’t really follow whatever it is you’re doing right now.”

“You take a guess at what’s wrong with me,” Garrett explains and wow, the guy sounds way too awake for… 12:47am. John really hopes this guy isn’t a night owl. He’s wrecked his sleeping pattern enough by himself and he wants to get it back to something resembling normal.

“Fine. Then can I sleep? Forever?”

Garrett laughs and John pretends not to notice how nice it sounds.

“Sure, buddy. Okay, now go ahead. Take your best guess.” 

“Okay. You’ve… killed three husbands. You’re a black widow and you’re only out here until the heat dies down and then you’ll kill again,” John jokingly guesses as he attempts to unfold the blankets on top of his cot with only one hand. He doesn’t do a very good job of it.

“Ooh, _very_ good. Got it in one. You should be a detective, or a lawyer, with how good that deduction was.”

“I am a lawyer.”

“Shit, really? Huh, don’t think we’ve ever had a lawyer up here before.” Garrett actually sounds impressed, and that makes John’s chest puff up a little with pride, but now he also sounds even more curious than he had before and John’s honestly too tired and really not in the mood to deal with that right now.

“Can I go to sleep now?”

“Slow your roll there, hot-shot. It’s your turn now.”

“Okay. Goodnight. Bye.”

The way he says it with a deadpan tone gets Garrett laughing again.

“Hey now, fair’s fair. Let’s see… I don’t know anything about you except that you’re a lawyer, but nine times out of ten, folks who usually come out here do it because they got dumped.”

“What, is that it? Is that why you’re out here?”

“Nope and I’m out here because I’m a black widow, remember?” John can’t see it, but he can hear the smile in Garrett’s voice. “Nah, you’re out here because… you were an up and coming lawyer, but then you had an affair with one of your clients and their spouse found out. They took a hit out on you, so you came out here to hide from the hitmen that are after you.”

John rolls his eyes. “Good night.”

“Good night, and welcome to the job.”

He puts the radio back in its charger before collapsing onto the cot’s hard mattress and drifts off.

\---

**Day One**

The rays of morning light pouring in between the boarded up windows is what wakes John up. It takes a moment for his eyes to focus, sleep crusting in the corners as he blearily stares at the ceiling. It feels like he only laid down a few minutes ago, but the clock hanging by the door tells him it’s been about seven hours since he went to sleep. And he still feels exhausted, but once he’s up, he’s up.

Sitting up, John takes in the room once more; pretty much everything is still in the boxes or his backpack and the windows are still boarded over. He should probably sort all of this out sooner rather than later.

John heaves himself out of the cot, stretching until he hears his back pop and gets dressed. He should probably start with the windows.

Pausing by the door after he’s found some tools to use to take down the wooden boards, John glances at the radio, debates with himself on whether or not he should call Garrett. He decides not to, figuring Garrett will call him eventually.

\---

Garrett calls when it’s late in the afternoon, the warm summer sky having turned a soft orange color, long after John has gotten everything squared away in his watchtower. He’s sitting out on the walkway with the door propped open, doing one of the writing exercises one of the rehab counselors had suggested, when the radio goes off, Garrett’s voice filling the silence.

“Good morning, John.” There’s a pause. “Well, more like ‘good afternoon.’ Anyway, there’s still a few hours of daylight to get some work in. So give me a call when you’re ready.”

John rolls to his feet, tosses the barely used notebook onto the desk and picks up the radio, looking out the window at the watchtower in the distance that he’s pretty sure is Garrett’s.

“Hey, sorry. I would’ve called earlier, but I got distracted with unboxing everything.”

“It’s no problem. Honestly? I’m kind of surprised you’re even awake right now. Most usually sleep away their first day out here. Sometimes even the second day too. That hike really takes a lot out of people.”

“Yeah, I’ve always been early to rise no matter what time I go to sleep.”

“I’m a little envious. Wish I could do that,” Garrett says. “Can’t tell you how many times I slept through morning classes during college.”

“Well there’s your problem right there; you took morning classes. No one does that unless they have a death wish.”

“Yeah, yeah, mock my pain later, John. Let’s get you acquainted with the job. There’s a thing in the middle of your room with a round map on it. Do you see it?”

John looks at it from where he’s leaning against his desk. “Kind of hard to miss it, but yeah, I see it.”

“Y’know, I thought it was just because you were tired last night, but you’re just always sassy aren’t you?”

“Guilty as charged.”

“Okay, we’re starting to get off track here. Alright, so – the thing with the round map? That’s the Osborne Fire Finder, invented in 1914 by W.B…” Garrett trails off, prompting John to finish the sentence for him.

“… Osborne?” There’s a wry smile tugging at his mouth, oddly pleased at how easy their interactions have been so far. John was sort of expecting things to be polite and stilted between them, at least for a while, especially considering the whole radio only communication so far.

“Exactly. So, you use the fire finder for, you guessed it, fi—what the _fuck?”_

Well that doesn’t sound good at all.

“What is it?” John asks.

It takes a moment for Garrett to respond, but he sounds distracted. “Nothing, I thought I saw—never mind. Where was I?”

“Fire finder.”

“Right, fire finder. You use it to—oh, fuck me!”

“Not that I don’t enjoy the enthusiasm, but we might want to slow this down a little.”

There’s a huff of laughter that sounds like Garrett can’t decide if he should find that funny or be exasperated. “Look out your west-facing window—are you seeing what I’m seeing?”

Doing as he’s told, John looks out the west-facing window and sees nothing but trees. Just as he’s about to say as much to Garrett, John sees it; colorful sparks of light against the orange of the sky.

It’s fireworks.

“Fucking _fireworks._ In the middle of a very flammable forest during the dry season! Good to know someone ignored the damn warnings about fire hazards. You need to get down there and stop them.”

“Is that really my job?”

“Your job is whatever I say it is,” Garrett tells him. “That and the nearest ranger is two days away and the forest will probably be up in flames by the time she gets here because of the idiot playing with fireworks.”

John sighs, but grabs his backpack, puts a water bottle, a compass, and a map in it and heads outs the door, radio in hand. “So what exactly am I supposed to do? Write them a ticket?”

“Easy there, Dirty Harry.” The teasing tone is back in Garrett’s voice, but it’s strained a bit. Probably because of the fireworks. “Just keep them from setting off any more. Take their shit, give ‘em a stern warning, whatever works. No fighting though.”

“There goes my plan of going in fists swinging.”

“You joke, but a guy got fired for that.”

“Wait, really?”

“Mhm. Wasn’t particularly fond of the guy, kind of a jerk.” Garrett falls silent for a few moments, probably checking his fire finder. “Okay, you’ll need rope to get down the shale between you and the lake. There should be one in the supply box on the way. The box number should be 306 and the code to unlock it is ‘1-2-3-4.’ It’s actually the same for all of them for future reference.”

“Wow, that’s secure. Are the passwords for the computers at the ranger stations ‘password’?”

“Shut up.”

John grins, but leaves it at that. He pauses briefly at the faded scribbles on the stair’s railing, pats them once before continuing on his way to the supply box. It doesn’t take him long to find it once he’s passed the tree line into the woods, the bright yellow of the box standing out amongst all the browns and greens of nature.

Opening the box after unlocking it reveals a map of the national park, some pine cones, a granola bar, the rope, and a note taped next to the map. Curious, John takes the note, skims it quickly.

“There’s a note here from a guy called ‘Dutch’ to someone named Jess.”

“That’s probably Richard Roosevelt, but most people just call him by his nickname,” Garrett tells him. “He’s one of those Doomsday preppers and Jess is his niece. She comes out here during the hunting seasons, but Dutch comes out here more often doing… whatever it is that he does, I’m not really sure. A lot of people think he’s nuts, but he’s harmless.”

“Is that right?”

“He’s more likely to complain about his permit to collect rain water being denied or talk about how untrustworthy the government is than to actually physically harm someone. Haven’t seen him around in a while though, so I don’t think you have to worry about running into him.”

John looks at the granola bar and debates if he should throw it away now or later. Probably later, when the fireworks aren’t a pressing issue. He takes the rope and quickly copies the marked spots from the box’s map to his own before locking it up again.

“Okay, got the rope.”

He keeps the rope coiled around his shoulder and follows the overgrown trail down, follows the sound of another firework being set off until he comes to the shale slide Garrett had mentioned. John looks down and good lord this thing is a death trap.

“You forgot to mention the shale slide being so steep it’s vertical.”

“I don’t remember it being that bad. It’s not even named.”

“Yeah, well I’d go with ‘Widowmaker.’”

Garrett chuckles while John hooks the rope to carabiner wrapped around a rock facing the drop off. “Come on, it’s really not that bad.”

John actually does a double take at the radio and feels a little silly for it, but again, this thing looks like a death trap and Garrett wants him to climb down it like it’s nothing.

“Not that bad? It’s a fifty-foot cliff made of rocks that look like knives!”

“They just look like knives, okay? Plus, there’s already a Widowmaker, so it’d just get confusing,” Garrett says and that honestly doesn’t make John feel any better about this. 

With a heavy sigh, John throws the rope over the ledge, tugs on it to make sure it’s secure, and begins rappelling down the shale slide. It’s not as difficult as he was expecting, but the sharp rocks still make him wary and tense in a way that reminds him too much his childhood, just waiting, always waiting, for the other shoe to drop.

John’s roughly half way down when the rope snaps and he falls the rest of the way.

One moment he’s watching the rope snap violently and he blinks, and then he’s staring up at the sky with rocks digging painfully into his back. It takes him a while to figure out what happened, the shock of it making it difficult to think as his heart thuds away loudly in his chest.

Nothing hurts too bad, pretty sure he hasn’t broken or twisted anything, mostly just sore, but John’s palms are scraped to hell and back.

The radio slipped free, probably when he landed, but it seems unharmed from where it lays next to him. John picks it up, presses down on the call button, still sprawled out on the ground.

“You might really want to consider naming this thing Widowmaker,” John grunts. “Or maybe just installing a ladder for it.”

“Are you okay?” Garrett asks, concern lacing his voice. “You didn’t break anything, did you?”

“Rope snapped on me and I’m still in one piece,” he assures him, getting back on his feet and heading towards the lake. “Just please never ask me to climb anything again.”

“Can’t promise you that, unfortunately, but I’ll see if I can get stronger rope sent out to us.”

John makes it down to a large clearing, a ledge and a lot of boulders off to one side and in the middle are a bunch of empty beer cans. Great, so the jackass setting off fireworks is also probably drunk, too.

“Found some beer cans,” John reports, cleaning up the trash with the plastic shopping bag that was conveniently left behind. Normally John wouldn’t care, but he figures he should probably take this volunteer job seriously and clean up the mess instead of just leaving the cans where they are. Whoever’s playing with fireworks obviously doesn’t care about accidentally setting the forest on fire so they’re not going to care about littering either.

“Drunk _and_ doing dumb shit with fire? Awesome, just fantastic,” Garrett grumbles. “This better not be Sharky trying to impress a girl again. I’ve already told him that if he causes another fire the park rangers are going to ban him.”

“This ‘Sharky’ starts a lot of fires, I take it?” John keeps walking, keeping an eye out for any more discarded alcohol. He’s kind of glad that it’s just alcohol he’s finding; John’s never had a problem with it, always been able to imbibe moderately unlike his father.

No, John’s problems were little white lines.

That’s the main reason he even considered doing this volunteer job. It’ll keep him far away from temptation; give him time to get his head on right.

_(“We care about you too much to just sit and watch you destroy yourself like this, John. At least think about it. I really think the peace and quiet out there will really help.”)_

“He’s the local pyro,” Garrett informs him. “Not a bad guy, but…”

“But he’s a pyro, which doesn’t mix well with a forest during the dry season. Or any season, really.”

“Exactly.”

There’s the smoldering remains of a poorly extinguished campfire and more alcohol. 

“They left half a bottle of whiskey.” He takes a look at the label and lets out a low whistle. “Good stuff too. Must be rich kids stealing from their parents liquor cabinet.”

It’s the _really_ good stuff, the kind he remembers finding in the Duncan’s liquor cabinet. Look, but don’t touch. They’d know if so much as a drop was missing. Alcoholics like his father, but functioning, high class alcoholics; a whole other league when he compares them.

“And they decided to have a campfire too,” John says, stamping out the remains, making sure there aren’t any embers ready to ignite the surrounding tall grass of the clearing. He remembers being a stupid rich kid, but he doesn’t think he was ever _this_ stupid.

But then again, the little white lines probably indicate that he’s a completely different kind of stupid.

“You know, they color coded the fire danger signs in case people were illiterate but I guess that doesn’t take into account just plain willful ignorance, does it?” Garrett sighs tiredly and John actually feels a little sympathetic. He’s probably been doing this a lot longer than John has or plans to and this more than likely isn’t the first time he’s had to deal with drunk idiots in the woods.

“Well, if they really are dumb rich kids they probably figure their parents money will buy them out of any trouble.” There’s a couple of brightly colored backpacks that catch his eye and he goes over to them. “Hell, it worked for me a few times.”

The few times he was willing to risk it anyway. He doesn’t tell Garrett that though; John likes the guy well enough, but they still don’t actually know each other well enough to actually talk about that.

“Oh? You’re a dumb rich kid too?”

John snorts. “Lawyer, remember? And I was _the_ dumb rich kid, thank you very much.”

He leaves the bags where they are, heads back over to the now extinguished campfire to pick up the rest of the beer cans and finds a bundle of fireworks amongst them. Hopefully the last of them. “Found the fireworks. They didn’t even bother trying to hide them.”

“Wow, that was easy. Thought for sure they’d at least try to be discreet about still having them.”

“Hoping I’d have to work for it?”

“Maybe a little.” And there’s that teasing tone again.

John finds some clothes – two flannel shirts, two pairs of jeans – laid out on a flat boulder not too far away. Still damp by the looks of it, more than likely left out to dry. “They left their clothes behind to dry. Looks like two people.” 

“Probably went swimming in the lake, it’s a good time in the year to do so. Hell, they’re probably still there; go tell them off and then head on back.”

“Sure.” He follows the dirt path to the lake shore, the sound of pop music getting louder and louder. Turns out it really was a couple of dumb kids, because he can see them fucking around with sparklers on the tiny island out in the lake. “Found them.”

“Is that a guy over there?” one of the drunk kids asks way too loudly, apparently having forgotten what volume control is.

“Enjoy dealing with that,” Garrett chuckles.

John doesn’t respond to that, just briefly scowls at the radio in his hand.

Instead he focuses on figuring out how to get the kids to cut out the firework shit without being too over the top about it. Though without the drugs to feed into his already easy to flare temper it shouldn’t be too hard to keep his emotions in check. “Cool it with the fireworks, alright? They’re a fire hazard.”

“Fuck off, buzzkill!”

“Chelsea!”

“What? He’s just some wannabe park ranger, he can’t actually do anything.”

Ugh, John forgot how much he hates dealing with drunks. Especially bratty drunks. Talking isn’t going to do any good, so he grabs the radio which gets their attention once more.

“Whoa! Hey! Put that down!”

“Seriously! Do you know how expensive vintage stuff is, jackass?”

John tosses the radio into the lake. Too bad too, he actually liked that song.

“You—you asshole!”

Probably wasn’t the best idea in the long run, but he’s got zero patience right now.

“Light another firework and it won’t be your stereo I wreck.”

“Oh fuck you, you psycho! You’ll pay for this!”

John rolls his eyes and turns away from the lake, ignoring the drunken insults and promises of revenge hurled his way, and heads toward the trail marked as Two Forks. So much for peace and quiet out here; first day on the job and he’s basically fallen off a ledge, cleaned up the mess left behind two drunk, bratty teenagers who then insulted him for telling them to _not_ cause a forest fire.

The radio in his hand crackles to life as the sun dips further behind the mountains.

“So how’d it go?”

He turns the question over in his mind, thinks of the best way to answer it as he hikes up the hillside, stepping over logs and fallen over trees. This should really get cleared up.

“Well enough, considering some of their personal property took a swim.”

“Oof. That’s definitely gonna be a complaint.”

“Can’t do anything about it now.”

“Nope… but, thanks for dealing with them though. Seriously.”

The sincerity in his voice makes John blink hard and he looks down at the radio. “No problem.”

The conversation lulls to a stop and the only sound is the river that John is walking along. It’s not so bad out here, now that he’s not having to deal with drunks. He actually kind of enjoys it, even if he does have to climb up rocks and ledges and use logs to cross the river at certain points.

“So… I have a bit of a confession to make,” Garrett says.

“Don’t tell me, you’ve already got your sights set on your next victim for when you can get back to your black widow ways.”

“Um, no not quite.” He sounds quiet and for a moment John wonders if it’s because his radio needs to be charged. But no, the radio’s power indicator is still flashing green at him. John can hear Garrett sighing and it sounds a little like frustration and disappointment. “Look… I was drunk last night when I welcomed you to the job.”

“You’re not the first boss to do that. Probably won’t be the last, either.”

“I know. I just… I shouldn’t have put you on the spot like that, asking why you’re out here and just being an absolute dick about it. It’s not a habit of mine. Getting drunk and being pushy, that is.”

Wow, Garrett actually sounds a little torn up about it.

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it,” John tells him and means it. Getting drunk doesn’t automatically make someone the devil and honestly it’s not even John’s place to judge that kind of thing, not when he’s done a lot worse than having one beer too many.

It’s a little funny in a completely unfunny way, that Garrett’s getting all twisted up over something that John wouldn’t even bat an eyelash at.

But then again, it’s not like Garrett has any way of knowing all of that.

“Thanks,” Garrett says, and it sounds small and ridiculously genuine with how much John’s acceptance apparently means to him, that it shocks John into silence with how much he suddenly wants to know what Garrett looks like. “Anyway, let me know when you make it back to your lookout.”

John keeps walking through the canyon, though it looks more like a gully to him, and finds another of those supply boxes. There isn’t much inside, just an antler and a flashlight he nearly blinds himself with trying to turn it on. What really catches his eye though, is the cave just off to the left of the box.

He knows he heard thunder not too long ago, but he’s just going to take a peek and then go back to his lookout. 

“What’s in this cave down here?” John finds himself asking Garrett as he heads inside, turns the flashlight on so he can see where he’s going and not accidentally go plummeting over a ledge.

“In Thunder Canyon?”

 _“Thunder_ Canyon?”

“I didn’t name it, jerk,” Garrett huffs, but John can hear the grin in it and it makes John grin as well. “But in the cave? I dunno, rocks. NFS tells people not to go too far in there. It’s pretty dangerous.”

“So…?”

 _“So,”_ Garrett drags the word out, “I say, fuck it. You’re a grown man. You can go where you want.”

“Great. Maybe I’ll come back and explore it sometime this summer. Though I think I’ll wait until you can order in some stronger rope.”

A thought pops into John’s head and he brings his free hand up as he yells into the cave, plays with the echo. “I bless the rains down in Africa!”

It’s really satisfying to hear it echo back at him.

John decides to poke around a little more, obviously not venturing in too far since there’s a storm brewing after all. So of course he comes across a locked gate. In a cave. That’s weird, right?

“This cave is gated off,” he tells Garrett. Reaching out, John wraps his free hand around one of the gate’s bars and gives it a good shake. It rattles a bit but it doesn’t look like it’ll be coming off any time soon.

“It’s to stop spelunkers and free climbers from dying without getting the keys from the Forest Service office first.”

“Makes sense,” John concedes, though it still looks weird and wrong to see something like a gate in a cave even if he can’t quite put his finger on _why_ it looks off.

“Although Nancy says she lost them three years ago, so its mysteries are locked away and lost to us forever.”

“Well that’s a downer.” John turns away from the gate, heads towards the other cave wall that looks like it can be climbed up and out to the forest. So he starts climbing.

“Yeah, but maybe you can find another one to get your caving kicks in. Or who knows? Maybe you’ll find some power tools and cut your way in,” Garrett says as John hauls himself up out of the cave and wow, he’s a lot closer than he thought because he recognizes those trees.

“Oh sure, because you can always find power tools just lying around the forest.”

John stops in his tracks when he gets that sensation of being watched. Looking up, he sees a shadowy silhouette standing on the cliff above him, just… _watching._ The guy turns a flashlight on and John has to narrow his eyes because the beam is right there in his eyes. Didn’t anyone teach this guy manners? Like not flashing bright lights in peoples’ eyes?

“Trust me, you’d be surprised about what you can find out in the woods.”

“Like this weird guy out here giving me the creeps and trying to blind me with a flashlight?”

“The creeps?” Garrett asks, sounding baffled by what John’s just said. “Wait, he’s _looking_ at you? Is he doing anything else?”

The flashlight shuts off and the guy wanders away, without saying a word. Well, that’s definitely not going to give John nightmares. At all, even though the hair on his arms are standing straight up.

“I don’t think so?” John stands there, staring at where the guy had been before finally turning away and walking down the trail.

“John, there’s something I… something someone should’ve told you about the area.”

“What is it?”

“It’s…” The way Garrett trails off makes John think it’s something actually serious for all of five seconds before Garrett finishes with, “Outside.”

“Come on,” John groans.

“The whole thing. And people come and go as they please. It’s… it’s madness!”

“I was beginning to think you were nice, but now I’m realizing just how wrong I was.”

\---

John finally makes it back to the lookout after climbing up the rest of the way, only to be met with a wooden cut out of Forrest Byrnes and his creepy smile and his obnoxiously bright yellow face. It startles John so much he swears his heart actually stopped for a few seconds.

“You know, I don’t think there’s any fictional character I hate more than Forrest Byrnes.”

“John!” Garrett mock gasps over the radio. “As an employee of the Forest Service, that is treason!”

“His smug aura mocks me. And what kind of name is _‘Forrest Byrnes,’_ anyway?”

“Well that’s what we like to call a pun, John. A beautiful pun.”

John groans as he chucks Forrest Byrnes and his smug, creepy smile over the cliff. “Please don’t tell me you’re one of those who think puns are actually funny.”

“Depends on how good the pun is.”

“So, I’m with you all summer, huh? With whatever this sense of humor is?”

“Can you even believe? You’re gonna love it.”

He rolls his eyes and heads back to the tower after getting rid of Forrest Byrnes. The sun has fully set as John trudges up them, pats once at the faded drawings on the railing as he goes by. Doesn’t even realize something’s wrong until he sees the big hole in the window by the door that’s been left wide open.

“Someone broke in.”

“They what?”

“They wrecked the place,” John tells him as he takes in the state of the room himself. “Broke a window too. Doesn't look like anything was stolen though.”

“Holy shit. I’ll let the Forest Service know what happened. Do you have any idea who could’ve done this?”

John sighs, closing the door and turning on the lights and starts looking for something he can use to patch the broken window for now. He'd really like to not get rained on seeing as how the heavy clouds keep drawing closer. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“I can’t believe someone would do this. Normally all I have to worry about are bears and fire and that’s about it.”

“Well now you can add B&E’s to that list.”

He manages to find some duct tape and a spare towel to cover up the huge hole in the window. It's not ideal, but it's better than just leaving it as it is.

“Forest robbery, great. Can’t exactly blame Robin Hood for this. Okay, in the morning I’m going to call Whitehorse. They keep a list of everyone who’s officially been in and out of park and he can give me a few names. We won’t get much, but at least if anything else happens we can use it to narrow it down or something.”

“Thanks.” John knows Garrett’s right; it’s not much, but he does appreciate it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kind of a dialogue heavy chapter, but then again, Firewatch is kind of a dialogue heavy game, depending on how you play it.
> 
> and brian and ned goodwin are characters from Firewatch and i kept them in this because i couldn't really decide on who from fc5 would fit in their roles
> 
> oh and before i forget, 'John' is slang for a toilet (or a sex worker's customer) so hopefully that will make the mention of a 'John' joke make sense??

He lays in bed for hours, just staring at the ceiling and listening to the nighttime sounds of the forest around him, to the sound of rain beating against the glass. It doesn’t matter how much he tosses and turns, sleep eludes him. Frustrated, John throws back the blanket and sits up on the cot, scrubbing roughly at his face. A quick glance at the wall clock tells him it’s almost 2AM.

Restlessness plagues him despite feeling exhausted, though he’s not sure if it’s a blessing or a curse; his dreams have been vivid and disturbing ever since he stopped, after he promised his brothers that he would stop.

Hunger bothers him almost all the time, though John’s managed to curb it as well as most of the other symptoms. He’d been warned that the worst of it would last roughly ten weeks, another reason he’d agreed to take this job.

No matter how bad the cravings got the distance and effort to make it back to the borrowed truck would more likely than not deter him from following through on those impulses.

John sits there on the edge of his cot, just staring at his shaking hands and shivers from the chills he gets. It’s not just because of the broken window and the chill from the storm and a sudden wave of self-loathing and shame rest heavily behind his ribs.

How pathetic is he? Barely a week out here and the cravings are coming in strong.

_(“You can’t keep doing this to yourself, John. Can’t you see that you’re killing yourself?”)_

A huge part of him wishes there was cell service out here so he could talk to his brothers, so he could talk to Rachel, a friend he’d made in rehab. Her poison of choice had been different from his, her demons different yet similar, but they’d still managed to bond during group therapy. She’d been the only one there that he liked being around. John misses her just as much as he misses his brothers and his niece, but they’d promised to keep in touch and they have, though she knows that they won’t be able to talk until the summer is over and he heads back to civilization.

Still, he wishes that he could call her or Jacob right now (he’d want to call Joseph too, but wouldn’t want to risk Faith waking up at this hour) and just hear either of them talk about anything at all, anything that came to mind, to soothe his fraying nerves.

But he can’t, so he tears his gaze away from his shaking hands and looks out the windows at the ominously dark woods. It’s funny, when he first arrived they looked so pretty in the dark, but now there’s something oppressive about them.

That’s probably just the withdrawal talking though.

Or maybe because the fog and rain casts a gloomy appearance to it.

A faint light in the dark catches his eye; a faint light from Garrett’s tower and John wonders if the man is awake too. Before he can even stop himself John’s up and over at his desk, grabbing his radio from its stand and pressing down on the call button.

“You still up?” He winces at how hoarse his voice is.

When there’s no immediate answer John starts internally berating himself; just because there’s a light on in Garrett’s tower doesn’t necessarily mean he’s awake.

“Of course. I never sleep,” Garrett jokes, though his voice sounds sleep rough. Probably hadn’t been sleeping, just dozing, and John would feel bad but the relief that floods into his veins overpowers any guilt. “What’s up? Sasquatch come by to welcome you to the neighborhood?”

An amused huff escapes him.

“No, sasquatch didn’t come by.” There’s a smile tugging at one corner of his mouth as he leans against the desk, still looking at the faint light from the other tower. It’s probably one of those camping lanterns or something. “Should I be expecting one to show up at some point?”

“Well I mean, if an eight-foot tall blur comes at you, you might as well just accept the inevitable.” Garrett makes a thoughtful noise. “I don’t think you’ll meet him before the summer is over, but if you ever run into a guy named Pratt all you gotta do is mention sasquatch and he’ll just launch into a rant about cryptids.”

“And I’d do that why?”

“Because he goes into a full on ‘Pepe Sylvia’-esque rant?”

John’s eyes narrow suspiciously.

“You’re bullshitting me.”

Garrett laughs sleepily and John can’t help but grin at the sound, feels a small twinge of something in his chest though he brushes it off easy enough.

“Why John, I would _never_ lie about Pratt’s passion for cryptids,” Garrett responds with mock hurt. “And I, for one, am offended that you would even think so. Is your opinion of me so little?”

“Well, you did admit to liking puns, so you kind of brought this on yourself.”

“You make fun of me now, but just you wait, you’ll be making puns left and right by the end of this summer.”

The cravings have subsided for now, the shake in his hands barely noticeable, and for once, John thinks he might be able to sleep without any bizarre dreams.

\---

**Day Two**

Okay, so he’d been wrong about not having any more weird dreams.

After his late night radio conversation with Garrett, John had tried falling asleep again, and he had. For a little while. Until a nightmare had made it impossible, so John gave up and made coffee.

Which is why he’s sitting at his desk, watching the sun rise with a mostly empty pot of coffee in his trembling hands. Too much caffeine, this was a bad idea, but at least he didn’t have to deal with anymore terrible dreams.

Still, bad idea because when Garrett calls him over the radio again John flinches so hard from the sudden sound of his voice that the coffee pot nearly flies out of his hand.

“Wake up. Hey, wake up.”

“I’m awake. I’m awake,” John says, burying his face into his free hand. He’s tired and irritable and wants to throw more radios into the lake in an attempt to make himself feel better, but he’s pretty sure that won’t work. And it’d probably result in this place getting trashed further or just set on fire or something. “What’s your problem?”

He groans at himself.

Great, getting snippy with the one and only person he kind of knows in the whole forest.

Either Garrett has the patience of a saint or something because he doesn’t snap back at him.

“Our problem,” Garrett corrects.

John pushes away from the desk, grabs the coffee pot to put in the sink to wash out later, and spares a glance at the confiscated fireworks. He should probably move them away from the wood burning stove; he hasn’t used it because it _is_ summer, but he’s sure Garrett would never let him live it down if the whole forest went up in flames because of his carelessness. Garrett would also probably be incredibly upset with him.

“Sorry, our problem,” John amends.

“That storm must’ve knocked out the phone line I use to talk to the service, which means we’re cut off. I tried radioing out and that’s not working either.”

“Let me guess, you want me to go fix it? I’m going to be honest with you, electrical work isn’t exactly something lawyers just automatically know.”

“Nah, I don’t need you electrocuting yourself.” He can practically hear Garrett rolling his eyes. “For now, just go check it out and we’ll go from there. I’ll probably have to go track a ranger down to get someone on it if it does need to be fixed.”

“Wow, you actually leave your tower?”

“Ooh, serving the sass early in the morning,” Garrett chuckles. “And I was going to have to go track down a ranger anyway if you want stronger rope.”

“It would be nice not having to worry about the rope breaking on me,” John says, though it’s kind of muffled by the shirt he drags over his head. “So, finding a telephone wire? I can do that. Where is it?”

“Remember that cave you hiked through yesterday? Down in the canyon?”

“Yeah, of course,” John says before tugging his boots on. He wonders if he can go back the way he came, though he’s a little wary about going near a cliff. Then again, he climbed on it in the dark, so he should be fine doing so during the day.

That and it’s probably a better option than going anywhere near that shale slide that nearly broke his back.

John grabs his bag and shuts the door behind him. He should probably start locking it; he just needs to find the key first. Taking a deep breath, John starts heading down the lookout’s stairs.

“So you’re going to want to go back there, go through it and keep going straight to the north when you come out.”

“Will do.” He pats the faded drawings on the railing which have faded a little more because of the rain.

“Thanks, John.”

One good thing about only communicating through radio is that he doesn’t have to try to hide the small smile on his face; it's nice, being thanked. It doesn’t happen too often outside of the courtroom after he’s won a case. Though the downside to radio only is that he gets hit with another surge of wanting to know what Garrett looks like, to put a face to the voice and name.

He hooks the radio to his belt as he passes by the outhouse and heads towards the ledge he had climbed up last night. Dealing with the shale slide, especially without a rope, is completely out of the question. Jumping down isn’t as bad as he might’ve thought, though he’s definitely going to have to look into patching up the gap in the short bridge along the path that leads to the cave.

The morning is colder than he had been expecting, the fog still hanging heavily in the air. John wishes he’d worn something warmer than just a flannel shirt layered over a t-shirt.

It almost doesn’t feel like summer at all.

“It’s actually pretty damn cold out here,” John says into the radio before hang dropping into the cave.

“It warms up fast, just give it about twenty minutes.” The cave doesn’t look as dark as it did yesterday, probably because the sun is coming up instead of going down, though most of the sky is still sort of clouded over. “I take it you’re not used to the cold?”

“Not really. It’s warmer in Georgia,” John admits as he exits the cave into the canyon, passes by the pond and moves through the brush.

“Georgia, huh? What’d you get up to down there? I mean, what’s life like?”

John freezes then shrugs, but then remembers Garrett can’t actually see him. There’s a lot he used to get up to back home that he doesn’t want to share, doesn’t want Garrett – who he barely knows – thinking less of him. He likes how easy it is to talk to him, how easy it is to joke with him, and it’ll be a very long summer if John ruins that. 

“Spent time with my family, mostly. I’ve got two brothers and a niece. And a good friend who’s like a sister to me at this point.” Not a lie, but keeping things light and far, far away from any thoughts or cravings of white powder. “What about you?”

“Family man, huh?” _No, not quite,_ John thinks but doesn’t say. He cares about his family, he really does, but someone who does what he did, using drugs to cope, can’t really call themselves a family man. “I’ve… Well, I’ve pretty much been unofficially adopted by the people I consider my family since I was nine. They live down in Falls End.”

“So you’ve lived in Hope County your whole life?” John asks as he continues to follow the directions Garrett gave him earlier, spots the telephone line and follows it.

“Yup. Born and raised. Went to Missoula for college though,” Garrett answers, though he sounds distracted. “Hey, is it okay if we put a pin in this conversation? There’s something I need to take care of, but I’ll still have my radio on me if you need anything.”

“Sure,” John agrees, though there’s a small pang of disappointment.

So far the wire seems to be fine, but John figures he might as well keep following it to the top of the trail. Maybe after he’s done checking he can go take a look at the abandoned cabin he spotted the other day after he had finished cleaning up his ransacked watchtower.

John follows the line for a long while, eventually coming across an old outhouse.

“Hey, I think I found an old outhouse,” he says into the radio. Maybe it means he’s almost to the end of the telephone line? Or maybe not, but Garrett will have a better idea of it than him.

“You don’t need my permission to go to the bathroom, John,” Garrett huffs in vague amusement and John eyes the radio warily, _daring_ Garrett to make a ‘John’ joke. Thankfully, he doesn’t. “But, you know, use abandoned outhouses at your own peril.”

“I meant, am I in the right area?” John replies, picking up an old notepad he finds lodged into the outhouse’s wall. “I have no clue where I am in general or where the phone line ends, smart guy.”

“Alright, lemme take a look at the map real quick. I do believe… uh, the comms wire runs for quite a ways. Follow it all the way up to the top of Beartooth point and if it’s not damaged, you can loop around back home.”

“I found an old notepad of… ha, I guess songs?” John casually flips through it. There’s a lot of slanted, cursive writing that sometimes trails off into hard to read print letters, but he thinks he gets the gist of most of what’s written. “Someone was writing a song call Ol’ Shoshone.”

To his surprise, Garrett actually starts singing the lyrics that John is looking at.

(It isn’t fair that Garrett has a nice sounding voice as well as a really good singing voice. If the guy turns out to be attractive too John’s going to… Well, John doesn’t know what he’s going to do. Probably protest at the injustice of some beautiful mountain man who can sing really well existing at all. It’d be some kind of cliché, like the lawyer with a coke habit.)

“Did you leave this out here?” John asks.

Garrett chuckles. “No, it’s not mine. But that means you’re near Hawk’s Rest.”

“Hawk’s Rest?”

“It’s an old watchtower that hasn’t been used in years. You should check it out.”

John lets out an amused huff before putting the notepad back where he found it. Looking around, he sees the abandoned cabin and sure enough, he decides to go check it out. Might as well take a break from all the hiking he’s been doing. Poking around the area just before the cabin reveals another supply cache, though it looks like it hasn’t been touched in ages.

He puts in the code and pops it open. There isn’t much inside except for a hat and a few acorns.

“Huh, I found an old hat from a Vietnam vet,” John says into the radio as he picks it up, turning it this way and that and finding no indicators as to who owned it or left it here.

“You’d be surprised how many former service members take this gig.”

“Makes sense.” He puts it back in the cache box, locks it back up again.

“I imagine if you’ve been through war you probably can’t get enough silence.”

John knows how true that is; Jacob isn’t like how he was before he joined the army. Of course, there were quite a few years where they all lost track of each other, so the change in Jacob probably wasn’t _just_ because of his time in the service. His oldest brother had always been the one who had few words to say out of all three of them, but over the years he’s had less and less to say depending on the situation.

Taking in the sight of the cabin, John notices that it’s also scorched pretty bad and the windows have been boarded up. As soon as he touches the doorknob the door itself falls off its hinges and into the cabin itself.

 _Lovely,_ John thinks dryly and carefully steps into the scorched cabin, careful of his weight distribution. He’d rather not fall through the floor, thanks.

There’s a ruined fire finder in the corner and most of the back wall is missing and there’s smashed furniture everywhere. There’s also a pack of old cigarettes on top of an intact cabinet which strikes John as odd.

 _Probably left here by whoever left the hat,_ John thinks and picks up the cigarette pack to throw away. No point in leaving them here for either the wildlife or hikers to find.

There are stairs that lead down below and into what looks like what used to be a bedroom. There’s more smashed bits of wood as well as a metal fold out chair with a battered looking guitar with only one string left on it, a moldy looking cot, more packs of cigarettes (which John picks up to throw away too), and an old stove.

He’s about to turn around and head back up when he hears an odd, skittering sound coming from the stove. John should leave it be, he really should, but curiosity gets the better of him.

Opening it, John immediately falls flat on his back with a hissed out curse as a raccoon lunges out of the stove.

The raccoon chitters at him before climbing up the tree root that is wrapped around the window frame. With slightly trembling hands and his heart pounding behind his ribs, John brings the radio close to his face again.

“I think I might have just gotten rabies,” John says, sagging back against the wooden floor, waiting for his heartbeat to calm down. 

“Go on…” Garrett replies and there’s that teasing tone of voice again that sounds far too amused.

“I decided to take a quick break from following the phone line and was looking around Hawk’s Rest and got attacked by a raccoon.”

“Did it bite you?”

“I don’t think so,” John answers as he checks himself over and doesn’t find any bite or scratch marks.

“Yeah, you’re probably fine,” Garrett assures him, then with a mischievous lilt adds, “It was probably just the ghost.”

John sighs in mock exasperation. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay. I see what you’re doing.”

“What do you mean? I just like to stay out of actually haunted places myself.” He can practically _hear_ Garrett’s sly grin. “I mean, haunted house attractions are one thing, but a house that’ actually haunted? No thanks.”

“Okay. Go on. Out with it,” John tells Garrett as he gets up from the floor and heads up the stairs, ready to get back to the task at hand.

“You want to hear about _Raccoon Carter?”_ John can’t help but laugh at the ridiculous emphasis Garrett puts on the absurd name. “So, some years ago, way before my time, a man named Winthrop Carter was stationed at Hawk’s Rest. He was one of those angry, loner types – just a real misanthrope. Which is Nancy’s polite way of calling him a _real_ jackass. Anyway, the story was, he lost his life savings betting on horse fights.”

 _“Horse_ fights?” John repeats in disbelief.

“In Mexico. So, he did what a lot of us do in times of trouble. He signed up with the Forest Service to watch for fires. His first night in his lookout, there was a break-in.” John rolls his eyes, but lets Garrett continue. “And the break-ins didn’t stop. Finally, one night he awoke to find someone in his lookout.”

“Was it the ghost of Christmas past?” John quips as he makes his way down the hill into what looks like a small valley. He spots a yellow cache box in the distance and heads towards it.

“Oh, if only. He reached for his axe and threw it at the figure, and just before the axe killed its target he heard a small voice cry, _‘help!’”_

“So what was it really?”

“A raccoon.”

“Oh. Of course.”

“See, back in the day the Forest Service wasn’t so good about dropping off food and supplies and… Carter was hungry. So he did what anyone would do. He skinned and ate it. Eventually Carter didn’t want anything else; it was raccoons or nothing. But one night, as he sharpened his raccoon blade, there was a scratching at the door. He looked towards it and, again, heard a tiny voice. _‘Help! Help!’_ He approached slowly, knife in hand, and ripped open the door. But no one was there,” Garrett continues as John makes his way through the tall grass. “But then, from under the bed he heard another small voice. _‘Help! Help!’_ Carter looked under the bed and, of course, there was nothing there either. So, startled, but believing he was just tired, Raccoon Carter went out hunting and for the first time in months came up empty. Now in bed, his stomach rumbling, he hears the voice again: _‘Help! Help!’_ And now he wonders if it’s coming from inside of him… But then, a figure appears at the end of his bed. He again reaches for his axe but in its place is another figure. He looks for the door and there are more and more figures! Beady, glowing eyes peering out through dark masks! He leaps out of bed, horrified, slips, and hits his head. And before he can get up, he feels hundreds of little fingers and razor sharp teeth digging into his skin. Far away, in Bighorn Tower, the lookout reported hearing a voice echoing through the valley. Loud at first, and then smaller and smaller until they faded away forever, _‘Help! Help! Help…’_ And that’s the story of Raccoon Carter. His ghost still wanders through the valley, moaning _‘Help! Help!’_ on hot summer nights.”

“Good lord that was absurd. Do you take writing tips from R.L. Stine?” John quips as he unlocks the supply cache. “And if it’s supposed to be true and Raccoon Carter died, how do we know this story?”

Garrett laughs and John can’t tell if the warmth that settles in him is because of how much he likes the sound of it or because the temperature is finally starting to warm up. Maybe it’s a bit of both.

“Okay, first off? Goosebumps was a fantastic bad horror series and you’re a liar if you say you didn’t like reading those as a kid, and two, I heard this from Nancy, so take that as you will.”

“Wait, so how’d the tower burn down?”

“Mmm, lightning? I don’t really know. Nature trying to purge the ghost.”

John huffs but decides to leave it at that and look through the supply box. There isn’t much in it, just a lot of pinecones and leaves and another note between Dutch and Jess.

“Hey, how come Dutch and his niece keep leaving notes to each other all over the place? Couldn’t they, I don’t know, use the postal service? Or email?” He puts the note back in the box before locking it again and heading back to follow the phone line. A thought strikes him. “Is there any chance it was either of them that I saw in the canyon last night? You know, the person with the flashlight?”

“Not likely,” Garrett answers. “Jess doesn’t really hang out around here when it isn’t hunting season, and I know I haven’t seen Dutch in a while, but he’s probably doing more work on his bunker or fighting for his rain collection permit.”

Well, that’s still one mystery left unsolved.

He keeps going, until a flash of light catches his eye. Upon closer inspection, it’s a bunch of beers cans and John gets the feeling he has an idea of who was messing with the phone line.

“Found a bunch of empty beer cans.”

Garrett sighs tiredly, obviously on the same page.

“Same kind you found by the lake?”

“Yup.”

“These fucking kids,” Garrett grumbles.

“How can these kids be so reckless?”

John climbs up the rock ledge the beer cans were left on. And looks around at the rocky ledge on the far side of the clearing, can imagine how it just leads to a sudden drop with no warning. There’s a bit of frustration that wells up in him; these dumb fucking antics are gonna get these dumb kids killed because they feel like they can just do whatever they want to and probably because they feel like the world owes them something?

_Projecting much?_

There’s an unamused huff of laughter before Garrett answers. “Trust me – never underestimate the stupidity of a drunk teenager. Also, I never underestimate the balls of a drunk young woman, having witnessed my sister’s rebellious phase.”

Things fall quiet between them as John hikes up to the highest point of the hill and sees the cut wire flapping uselessly in the breeze.

“Yeah, the wire is definitely down. I just found it. Along with more empty beer cans. And I think it’s safe to say it wasn’t the wind and that it was cut deliberately,” John reports as he picks up the piece of paper weighed down by a rock. _Go to hell_ is written sloppily with what looks like a not so flattering drawing of him.

“I _knew_ it the moment you said you found the beer cans,” Garrett grits out, sounding frustrated and on the border of being pissed. “First they fuck around with fireworks and leave their trash everywhere and now they’ve been messing around with _live_ wires. Do they not realize this is how people die? I mean, what if something happened to one of the lookouts while this was going on? And God forbid if there was an actual _fire_ burning out of control. Hell, they could’ve electrocuted themselves when they cut that thing in the first place!”

“Hey, take a deep breath and count to seven,” John tells him, keeping his voice calm and low. He’s surprised when Garrett actually listens to him and does as he says. “You good?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Alright, so what do you want to do about this?”

“I want you to go find them.”

“And then what do I do? I’m not exactly well versed in apprehending criminals as I am getting them out of a prison sentence.”

“Not sure yet; nothing’s come to mind that isn’t illegal.” Garrett pauses before continuing. “Best bet is probably just scaring the hell out of them. Make them think twice before ever pulling dangerous shit like this again.”

“Yeah, I’d make a spooky ghost costume, but they stole most of my sheets.”

“Hmm. I don’t know… Wait for them to wander off and wreck their camp, make it look like a bear came looking for food.”

John grins. “I can do that. But I am going to need a raise.”

Garrett chuckles. “Don’t hold your breath. You should probably hike back towards your tower and keep an eye out for anything that leads you to them. Probably a trail of beer cans. They’re probably not exactly where they were yesterday, but they might be close to the lake still.”

“On it,” John says before clicking off his radio.

Turns out he doesn’t have to search very hard for a trail of actual beer cans; it’s literally down the other trail that leads up to where he is and it veers towards the lake.

\---

He comes to a split in the trail, decides to search the trail that goes off to the right first, just in case. John finds a green supply box that is completely empty and what looks like a cable car line over a ravine. Weird.

“What’s a cable car doing out here?” John asks into the radio.

“That’s how you get to my sector. Well, the quickest way anyhow.”

“Really? Well, let me hike over.”

“It’s locked up and mainly used for emergencies. I’ve never actually used it. Rangers use it every now and then, but that’s about it.” The teasing tone comes back. “Though I know you’re dying to get a look at my gorgeous face, it will sadly have to wait for another time, seeing as how I’m not at my tower right now anyway.”

His mouth twitches up at the corners, trying to pull into a smile. What is he doing? Flirting with a friend of a friend of Jacob’s?

 _It’s just because he’s the only other person out here that I talk to on a regular basis,_ he tries to convince himself. _It doesn’t mean anything. Besides, it’s only been, what? Two days? And we’ve only been talking over the radio, so there’s no possible way it’s real attraction._

It doesn’t sound as convincing as he’d like it too.

\---

John finds a backpack hanging in a tree.

“There’s an abandoned pack out here,” John reports before trying to find something to try to knock it out of the branches.

“It doesn’t belong to one of the teens’?”

“No, looks like it was lost out here a long time ago.”

He reaches up and tugs on a strap, making it slide loose from the branches.

“Might as well pilfer it for supplies,” Garrett suggests. “If it’s been out here long enough I doubt anyone’s still looking for it.”

Inside John finds a disposable camera (27 out of 30 uses left) and a rope.

“Found a rope, which will be handy, though I think I’d still prefer if you could get something sturdier sent out. And a disposable camera,” John says as he hooks the rope to a carabiner he finds at a ledge that leads down.

“Oh man, I don’t think I’ve seen a disposable camera since 2003. I’m surprised they still make them. Are there any uses left?”

“Yeah, he only used three of them.”

“Neato.”

“Thank you, Brian Goodwin.”

“Wait, wait… who?”

There’s something odd in Garrett’s voice as John finally reaches solid ground and decides to leave the rope where it is.

“The bad had the name ‘Brian Goodwin’ sewn into the top,” John explains. 

“Huh. Wow,” Garrett says in stunned disbelief.

“Someone you know?”

“Yeah, I just… haven’t heard that name in a while.”

“Ex-boyfriend?” He winces at the nervous hint in his voice and hopes that Garrett doesn’t catch it.

_(This doesn’t mean anything. So what if he might have an ex-boyfriend?)_

There’s a surprised bark of laughter. “Brian Goodwin? Uh, yeah, no. Not an ex-boyfriend. Especially considering he was like, twelve years old when I knew him.”

John rolls his eyes, though the apprehension in his chest relaxes. “Okay, so who was he?”

“He was stationed in Two Forks – your lookout – with his dad, Ned, about three summers ago. Great kid. Really imaginative. I still have the drawing he gave me the last time I saw him.”

“You can bring children out here?” John’s never heard about it, but then again, it’s not like he ever paid attention to what was and wasn’t allowed in national parks before this summer.

“No…” Garrett admits guiltily. “You know I’m not a stickler for rules. They took off halfway through the summer.”

“Why?”

“Never got a specific reason. I tried radioing Ned one day and never got an answer, so I went to the tower to see if anything was wrong, but the place was empty. I think at one point they realized this job just wasn’t for them. For Brian, at least.”

 _But that doesn’t explain why Brian’s bag was left in the tree,_ John thinks but doesn’t say. Something about this leaves him feeling uneasy.

\---

“Hey, uh, Garrett?”

“What’s up? Did you find ‘em?”

“No, not yet.” John reaches out and curls his fingers into the fence. “Why would there be a fence out here?”

“Oh, because hikers sometimes go ass over teakettle when on a trail.”

“So the Forest Service would put up a big chain link fence?” John asks, eyes glancing at the green _‘No Trespassing’_ sign.

“A chain link fence?”

“Yeah. It looks like it surrounds a huge area.”

“Huh. That’s weird.”

\---

The trail of beer cans leads him to an absolutely charred area of forest before it just disappears completely.

“Alright, so the trail goes cold at this burned section and I have no idea where to go from here.”

“Hmm, sounds like you’re out by Mule Point. No one would camp out in the fireweed. Well, I’d love it if you could keep looking. Y’know, as a favor to little ol’ me.”

“My pleasure,” John responds with dry amusement.

“We know these kids are sloppy. They must’ve left a trail of some kind.”

John spends a good ten minutes searching for something – _anything_ – when Garrett lets out a frustrated sigh.

“Ugh, I hope you’re doing better than I am right now. I’m having a hell of a time trying to get this fucking flapjack off his ass and out to repair the wire.”

That stops John short and he just blinks. “Excuse me? _‘Flapjack?’”_

“You know. Like, a loser. A chach.”

“I have never, in my entire life, heard anyone call someone a flapjack.” There’s a spot that looks like he can slide down safely enough into the canyon and make his way back towards the lake. It’s his best bet so he rolls with it. 

“Well the next time you’re at a bar and some banker steps on your foot so he can order his crappy martini – _shaken, not stirred_ – you’ve got just the name to use.”

“You’re so weird. Why are you like this?” John finds himself asking aloud and immediately wants to bury his face in his hands. _Real smooth, John._

But he shouldn’t have worried, because this is Garrett and he apparently never takes anything as an insult. “I ask myself that question every day. Maybe it’s something in the water.”

“Maybe you should get in on that rain collection with Dutch.”

“Oh yeah, we can go halfsies.”

He comes to a stop to look out over the horizon; he’s in the canyon, but higher up than he was yesterday, so he can see so much more of it. When did it get so late in the day? It feels like it wasn’t all that long ago he was sitting in his lookout chugging an entire pot of coffee.

“Wow, I’m on top of a natural bridge out here.”

“Really?” Garrett asks in genuine excitement. “Is it a complete arch?”

John takes a better look and no, it isn’t.

“No, I guess the bridge is out here. Still, I think I can jump the gap to get across the canyon.”

“You’re a regular Clutch Nixon,” Garrett quips as John gets ready to make a running jump to the other side.

“Oh yeah, you should see the jumpsuit I’m wearing.”

\---

After about another twenty minutes of traipsing through the wilderness and climbing up rocky ledges, John enters a part of the forest where the growth is denser and looks a lot greener than he’s seen in the rest of the area so far.

He comes across what he assumes is the ‘medicine wheel’ that he had copied onto his map from the one in the cache box. It’s a lot of stones set out in a specific shape. John wonders how long it’s been here.

“Hey, do you see that?”

John looks up above the top of the trees.

“Yeah, I think so. That thin plume of smoke?” For some reason it reminds him of the old cigarettes he found in Hawk’s Rest.

“Yep. It looks way down to the southwest. You should be able to find a way over there from the meadow by the lake.”

“You think it’s those girls?” John starts heading over there anyway, careful to not disturb the medicine wheel.

“I’m pretty sure it’s a campfire, so yeah. I’d call that a safe bet.”

“Man, they _really_ do not give a shit, do they?”

Garrett sighs.

“Not a one.”

\---

There’s another yellow cache box when John gets to closer to where the smoke is coming from. Inside is an educational flyer about bears, more pinecones (seriously, why do people keep putting these in the boxes?), half of a log, and a missing person’s flyer.

John takes it, looks at one Mitch Michaels who has been missing since July of 1981. It gets him thinking of Brian’s backpack that had been left up in that tree, of how the Goodwins had just suddenly up and left and Garrett never heard from them again. What if they went missing too?

“How many hikers go missing out here?”

“More than none, unfortunately,” Garrett answers with an air of resignation. Out here it’s probably a sad fact of life that one has to accept and learn to deal with. “With most of them being in this area – the Thorofare – because it’s so remote. Why the interest?”

“I found an old flyer for a missing hiker. It just got me thinking, that’s all. Like how you said one day you were talking to the Goodwins and then the next you weren’t.”

“Ned Goodwin didn’t get mauled by a bear or stuck in a ravine. He was a jerk with PTSD who dragged his son out to do a job and realized it was a bad idea.”

“PTSD? That doesn’t sound good.”

He remembers how bad Jacob had been, when they all found each other again. Those were a terrifying two years; he and Joseph had been scared that Jacob would put a bullet in his head just to make the night terrors and episodes stop. Jacob managed to pull through it though, got professional help at Joseph’s urging. John can’t imagine what it would be like trying to deal with something like PTSD in what is basically isolation. Sure, the guy had his son with him, but no kid is equipped to deal with something that serious. No kid should be.

“Ah, I don’t know. He was in the army. He was… off. It’s actually kind of sad. Ned was only discharged because his mother – Brian’s grandma – died. She’d been taking care of him and Ned was the only next of kin.”

“Damn. And you got to know Brian a little bit?”

“Yeah. I talked to him way more than Ned, that’s for sure. Hell, half the time I was sure the kid was doing his dad’s job for him.”

“How was he at spotting fires?”

“Better than you,” Garrett chuckles. “He actually liked to stay in the tower. Furthest he’d ever go willingly was halfway down the stairs to draw on the railing, or so he told me.”

Well, that answers that. He’d sort of suspected that they were left by Brian when Garrett first mentioned him.

The plume of smoke isn’t too far away, so John heads into the aspens. For as much as he’s not a fan of nature, it’s really pretty out here. And of course this is when he finds a turtle on a large rock. Carefully picking it up, John grins when its head pops out of its shell.

“I found a turtle. Or maybe a tortoise? It’s a thing with a shell.”

“Well isn’t that something?”

“It’s actually pretty cute.”

“Well, John, if you decide you want it to keep you company, nobody will mind.”

“Hmm, now what do I name it? It looks like a…” John wonders aloud. Then it hits him; it sounds ridiculous, but he _knows_ Garrett will appreciate it. “Turt Reynolds.”

It earns him bright sounding laughter.

(He enjoys it too much, making Garrett laugh.)

“Well now I can’t wait to see him!”

“The mustache _is_ impressive.”

“Tell him I love Cannonball Run.”

\---

After finding (and adopting) Turt Reynolds, it doesn’t take John long to find the campsite, though it’s surprisingly empty.

“I found the campsite,” John reports as he stomps out the smoldering remains of the campfire. “I swear, they must’ve dragged like four cases of beer out here with how many empty cans I’ve found littered all over the place. It’s giving me flashbacks to college.”

“Track them down. And don’t let them see you.”

“What a job this is,” John says under his breath. Taking a quick look around the now extinguished campfire, John finds his stolen sheets in a pile next to a mostly full crate of beer and some discarded magazines. “I’ve entered the _‘Teen Zone.’”_

“Oh really? And where’s that?”

“Apparently it’s the name of a magazine for girls.” He snorts at the title of the other magazine. Who comes up with this stuff? “I found some ‘Dangerous Hunks.’”

“I—What…?”

“Another magazine,” John clarifies.

John moves away from the campfire and over to the obnoxiously bright orange tent, but the closer he gets the more he sees how absolutely wrecked it is.

“Okay, so either they really don’t give a shit about how they treat their personal belongings or an actual bear beat me here,” John reports, carefully toeing at the shredded clothes and ripped sleeping bags. “Because everything looks messed up.”

“Uh, that’s not good.”

“Tent looks like someone tried putting it through a paper shredder but chickened out halfway.”

“What could’ve done that? A bear, maybe? Or, I know it sounds crazy, but even a bull elk if it’s off its rocker.”

“Well for one thing, I’m pretty sure you’re always crazy.” John looks closer, but doesn’t really see anything that would indicate an animal attack. Although then again, he’s not exactly an expert so what does he know? “But I don’t think an animal did this. I don’t see any blood or anything. And the food looks untouched.”

There’s a fluttering that catches his eye. Turns out to be a note.

The note turns out to be even less flattering than the caricature they left of him by the cut phone line. He also really doesn’t appreciate the things they’ve accused him of.

“Well, looks like they won’t be coming back if their strongly worded letter is anything to go by.”

“What’s it say?”

“They’re threatening to call the police because they think I attacked them and stole from them.” He’s met with an uncomfortable silence. “You don’t think I did this, do you?”

“No, of course not,” Garrett assures him. “Whatever ruined their campsite could honestly be anything. Weird things happen in the woods. It could be other campers. They could be having a bad mushroom trip. Hell, they could’ve done it while they were _drunk._ We really don’t know. But they’re gone. There’s no way to call the cops. They’re not coming back, and we can get to work. I don’t know about you, but I’d really like to start enjoying a quiet summer.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“And I’d love to see Turt Reynolds.”

It’s ridiculous how much that makes John feel better.

He tears up the note and drops the scraps in the stream on his way back to his watchtower, intent on forgetting this bump in the road and looking forward to the rest of the summer.

(Looking forward to maybe meeting Garrett at some point. Being finally able to put a face to the name and the voice. To actually knowing what that smile looks like.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i just really love the idea of John having a pet turtle named Turt Reynolds???
> 
> (also u can't tell me that john doesn't fall hard and fast for the deputy in any scenario, considering he sees the deputy once in the intro and then after that Adelaide and Sharky are like "the guy has a big ol' crush on you")


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: when left to his own devices, garrett's sense of style swings wildly between plain t-shirt and jeans (with maybe a flannel shirt) to a horrifying amalgamation of ugly floral shirts (and tank tops like the testy festy one) and wearing heart-shaped sunglasses (which i'm disappointed weren't actually in game) and there's no in between. basically he's a fuckin fashion disaster but so is john, just in a different way, so really they're perfect for each other lmao

**Day Three**

He’s finally able to get around to boarding up the broken window.

There hadn’t been any time yesterday because of the whole… phone line situation. And then when he’d gotten back it was pretty late and he had to find something to use as an enclosure for Turt Reynolds. He’d ended up using one of the now empty cardboard boxes. It’s not ideal, but it’ll do for now.

Garrett calls when he heads down the stairs to get more wooden boards for the window.

“Hey, John…”

“Yeah?” he grabs up some boards that are laying haphazardly in the dirt.

“Um, what do you… look like?”

“Why are you asking?” He quashes the little flicker of hope that tries to flare up in his chest. _You’re out here to deal with your cravings, not get head over heels for the guy who’s basically your boss._

“Because I’m _horribly_ superficial.”

John rolls his eyes, juggling the wooden boards and the radio as he climbs back up the lookout’s stairs.

“I could be Tom Cruise’s good looking twin brother,” John says dryly.

“Oh, that’s too bad. He’s like five foot nothing.”

“Okay, so I’m the good looking, _taller_ twin brother,” he amends.

“Well that gives me a good start. Now let’s see…” Garrett muses and John focuses on trying not to hit his fingers with the hammer. “In my scope all I can tell is that you’re a white guy wearing jeans. Jeans in the summer? Really?”

“Yes, really. I don’t like wearing shorts.” He wonders if he should duct tape the glass where it’s cracked around the edges of the hole, to keep loose shards from falling free. If it took Garrett the better part of an hour to get someone out to fix the phone line, John bets that it’ll take even longer for someone to be sent out here to replace the pane. “Not exactly my style.”

“Worried about high fashion in the forest?” Garrett asks, amusement lacing his voice. “Alright, so you’re not a big fan of shorts. What is your style, then?”

“Tuxedos, as often as possible,” John answers, half-joking. He hasn’t worn one since the last time the Duncans had a large, formal social gathering before their… before their car accident.

John still has mixed feelings about their passing. About them in general. He tries not to think about it too much.

_That’s how you ended up here though, isn’t it? How you ended up in rehab? Because you just couldn’t fucking think,_ he berates himself.

“Oh, really.”

“You bet.” John hopes Garrett can’t hear the tightness of angry, bitter tears in his voice. He’s not crying, but it’s very close to it and he doesn’t want to. Not right now anyway.

“How cosmopolitan. I didn’t realize Atlanta was so chic,” Garrett says with a ridiculous fake accent, making John chuckle.

“I’m actually from Rome, which is the _peak_ of high society,” he replies with an equally fake bad accent.

“Mmm, good to know dear, yes.” Garrett drops the fake accent when he asks his next question. “Now tell me about your face. I’m looking at you from across the bar. What do I see?”

“A pretty thick beard.” John tries picturing them meeting in a bar somewhere, but all John can see is a blank face. He really has no idea how to even imagine what Garrett might look like.

“Oh man, I’m actually kinda jealous. I can never grow more than a five o’clock shadow. My br—my friends always tease me about it.” Before John can even think to ask what Garrett was originally going to say, the man keeps the conversation moving. “Have you always had a beard or is this to perfect your seasonal mountain man look?”

“For a while, yeah.” John puts up the last board. 

“Alright, perfect. I wanna know about your eyes.”

“Get out of here.”

“I’m drawing you. I need to know, otherwise you’re leaving me with artistic license or just leaving half your face blank,” Garrett says wryly and that actually stops John short. Makes his mind go blank.

“You’re what?”

“Is that okay?” Something about the way he responded must’ve sounded upset or something, because now Garrett sounds unsure. He seems to bounce back from it though. “Don’t answer. I’m going to do it anyway. So, your eyes. Tell me.”

John doesn’t really know how to answer that. He’s been told his eyes look sad before. _(“A pair of sad, sad puppy eyes,” someone had once said, though now he can't remember who.)_ Putting the hammer down, John moves over to lean against the railing. “Melancholic, I guess? I don’t really know how to describe eyes.”

“Okay got it. Thank you, John.”

Startled by the abrupt silence, John looks down at his radio. “You get what you need?”

“Absolutely.” There’s a smile in his voice and it makes John smile too, however faintly, as he looks out over to the Thorofare tower in the distance.

“So I got the window patched up. What should I do now? What’s next?” John asks, pushing away from the railing and picking the hammer back up to put it away in the toolbox inside his tower.

“What’s next? What do you think is next?”

“Well this is the first time I’ve worked a job like this, so I really have no clue what’s expected of me. Do I have to go fight a bear at some point? Fend off pyromaniacs?” He looks over at Turt Reynolds’ cardboard box. If there’s nothing else expected of him he should get started on making a proper enclosure for the little guy. “You’ve been the one giving me tasks for two straight days.”

“What’s next is you sit in that room until September 1st and call me at the first sign of smoke. Otherwise what you do with your time is up to you. Though I do like that you think this job will be more exciting, but I think the rangers will frown upon elbow-dropping the wildlife.”

“Oh, yeah.” He’d gotten used to the near constant activity of the past two days. Too busy to think about much save for the night when the quiet rustle of the trees is the only thing to focus on. John doesn’t really know what he’ll do with himself for the next few months. Maybe actually deal with his problems and sort himself out. Maybe _think_ for once.

“I mean, we’ve issued you a comfy chair and everything. It’d be a shame if you didn’t use it.”

“You know, it’s really not that comfy. It’s wooden, there’s no padding, I actually think I got a splinter in my thigh this morning…”

“Aww. Regardless, take a seat. The forest depends on you.”

\---

**Day Nine**

John’s sitting out on the natural sort-of-bridge in Thunder Canyon, looking out over the horizon as the sun sits low in the late afternoon sky, his notebook lying next to him is barely written in, only a few pages covered front to back in graphite. He’s been enjoying his time out here in the Whitetail National Park more than he thought he would, his days mostly filled with quiet contemplation or adding more things to Turt Reynolds’ new enclosure or talking with Garrett over the radio. 

The radio crackles to life and speak of the devil.

“Hey, John. Having a nice afternoon?”

_It’d be nicer if you were here,_ John wants to say but doesn’t. He still doesn’t even know what the guy looks like. “Yeah, it’s really great. I might never leave.”

“Well, uh… I’m calling with some not so great news. Two young women, Chelsea Stevens and Lily McClain were reported missing. They’ve got parents out in California who haven’t heard from them in a week. They were supposed to meet an aunt over in Missoula. If they’re the girls from last week then you’re probably the last person to have seen them.”

His eyebrows shoot up in surprise. Huh.

“I doubt I’m the last person to see them, but you should tell whoever that I’m happy to be questioned.”

“Look, it’s not going to be an issue. I mean, if they turn up dead, then maybe. Should I just not say anything and save us the trouble?”

John wants to agree to ignore it, but he’s trying to be better; trying to be a better person who doesn’t ignore his problems and end up in the hospital because of an overdose.

“I… I think it’s worth mentioning something.”

“Yeah. I’ll keep it vague. I really don’t want to talk to the cops.”

“Bad history?”

There’s a huff of laughter, but it doesn't sound happy. “Kind of? I used to be one, but I quit after…”

“After…?” John prompts. He doesn’t want to push too much, but now he’s curious.

“After some really not good things happened,” Garrett admits and John will take it, doesn’t expect it when Garrett continues. “The Sheriff’s department was pretty crooked for a long time - still is, actually - and… I tried, to make things better, but I was just a Deputy and apparently the only one with a working conscience.”

“Well that’s more than a lot of law enforcement can say about themselves. And you were a Deputy?”

“Yeah, though no one shot the Sheriff.” John can practically hear Garrett grinning as he groans at that bad joke. “Thanks, by the way. Enjoy the sunset, John. Oh, and before I forget, the new rope I ordered has finally come in, so I’ll be able to get it out to you sometime in the next few days.”

John pretends not to notice the excitement that swells in his chest and focuses his attention on the setting sun.

\---

**Day Eleven**

He’s been trying to not get his hopes up for the past two days.

Of course, that means Garrett shows up when John least expects it.

John had been sitting, sprawled out, outside of the tower room, bare feet kicked up on the rungs of the railing with Turt Reynolds walking around on his chest when he hears a very familiar voice, except that it isn’t coming in over the radio.

“Wow, you didn’t tell me you had tattoos.”

John jerks forward at the sound, one hand coming up to cradle Turt Reynolds to his chest so the turtle doesn’t go flying from the sudden movement.

When he looks over to the stairs, John can feel the moment his heart actually stutters, because standing there is probably the prettiest guy he’s ever seen, grinning at him with honest to god _dimples._

“What are you doing here?” John doesn’t bother to ask who it is because he already knows. He’s spent nearly two weeks listening to that voice and knows immediately that this is Garrett.

“Rope delivery.” Garrett points to the bundle of rope coiled around his shoulder. “And I figured you could do with some company. It was pretty rough for me, my first year doing this job.”

“Do you do this for all the new fire watchers?” John asks, still stunned, as Garrett swings his backpack off with the coil of rope and sits down next to him.

“Nope. I don’t actually talk to the other watchers all that much other than when they report in or if I need to update them about something.” And then Garrett’s face lights up when he catches sight of the turtle. “Turt Reynolds, I presume?”

All John can do is nod and hand over the turtle when Garrett holds his hands out. This is… this is too much; he knows he wanted to know what Garrett looks like, wanted to see the smile that matched the laugh, but this is far too much. The dimples, the way his nose scrunches and his eyes crinkle at the corners, how he feels so at ease around John and in his space that it doesn’t seem like it would ever occur to him to be wary, to walk on eggshells around him.

It’s too much yet not enough at the same time and he can’t help but feel greedy for more.

Of course he says none of this, because that would be mortifying and embarrassing and he’d have quit this job immediately and leave with Turt Reynolds, never to return to Whitetail National Park.

Instead, what he says is this: “That is the ugliest shirt I’ve ever had the misfortune to look at.”

There’s a small smile on Garrett’s face when he says that, like it’s a joke that only they are in on but John doesn’t know what it could possibly be. “I know, right? That’s what makes it so great and I love it.”

“No wonder you live out in the woods. I bet that’s the real reason you live out here, because of your awful taste in shirts.”

“Yeah, you caught me,” Garrett jokes, handing Turt back over to him. “My shirts were so ugly they kicked me out of town. It got so bad there were traffic accidents because no one could look away from the obnoxiously bright colors.”

John rolls his eyes, grabbing the coil of rope as he gets up to put Turt back in his enclosure. When he comes back out, he finds Garrett swinging his pack over his shoulder. “I should probably head out. It’s a long hike back to Thorofare if I wanna make it before the sun goes down.”

There’s a hint of reluctance in his voice and John doesn’t want him to go, not yet.

But it feels way too soon to ask him to stay, despite how much John wants to.

“You should come by again sometime. Maybe stay longer than five minutes.”

Garrett’s face brightens. “Yeah, I’ll definitely plan my next visit better than this. It was nice to finally meet you in person. You look a lot different than what I drew.”

He holds out his hand and John shakes it, finds himself drawn in by the odd chill in Garrett’s fingertips.

(Finds himself feeling even greedier.)

“Garrett Rook,” Garrett says, formally introducing himself.

“John Seed.”

They stay like that a few moments too long until Garrett finally lets go and John has to will his hand to not chase after Garrett’s.

“I’ll see you around, John Seed,” Garrett says, throwing one last smile his way before turning around and descending the stairs.

“Yeah,” John croaks out quietly, mouth having suddenly gone dry, heart thudding loudly in his ears.

\---

**Day Thirty-three**

John finds himself out in the forest again, though thankfully it isn’t to track down rowdy teenagers this time.

He’s standing by a trail sign that points out the direction to the Thorofare supply drop and looking at his map to gauge just how much of a hike he has left. A little more than a mile, and Garrett wasn’t kidding that it’s a long way from Two Forks to Thorofare.

“Is it too much of a pain in the ass to bring the supplies all the way up to our towers?” John asks into the radio as he starts walking down the dirt trail again, passing a few burnt trees.

“Well, I get my stuff hand-delivered. Perks of six years of service. You’re hiking in 90 degree heat and I get to do crosswords. Isn’t life miserably unfair?” Garrett asks, and John can hear the amused smile in his voice, can actually picture it. 

“Absolutely,” John answers. He takes in the scenery as he goes; there’s a lot more pine trees on this side of the ravine. A lot more trails that have been well taken care of too. He hasn’t come across a single shale slide since he left the Two Forks area and that alone makes him like the main Thorofare area better.

“Anyway, when you find the supply drop, remember: it’s not just you. Other lookouts, biologists, a few people get their food there and I don’t want to have to call in for more. There should be loads of good stuff though. Beans, prunes, jerky,” Garrett lists off just to be a little shit; he knows John hates all of those and John curses him a little for it. “You know, my sister eats six prunes a day. Six. She’s, like, really precise about it.”

“She does not, you big liar,” John says, trying not to retch at the thought of prunes, which in his opinion, are an abomination created by nature. “No one would willingly eat six prunes a day, every day.”

“Oh believe me, she _absolutely_ does. She even won a prune eating contest when she was in college. She was sick for days after that, but still.”

“Anyone ever tell you you’re a bad liar?” John asks before he starts climbing up a rocky slope with the help of a few conveniently placed ropes.

“Always. I could never get away with anything as a kid.”

It falls silent between them after that, John focused on finding his way to the supply drop. He doesn’t understand why no one has built any bridges for a lot of the gaps in the trails, just leaving logs in place instead which seems like a bad idea that will come back to bite the Forest Service in the ass at some point. 

Garrett would probably know.

But he doesn’t ask, just continues following the trail until it splits off into two directions; one towards the supply drop, the other towards the Thorofare tower. John’s already over here, he could go see him, drop in unexpectedly like Garrett did a couple of weeks ago.

_Too soon,_ a fearful part of his mind whispers. _Too soon._

And it does, it feels like it, but there’s a part of him that just wants to say _‘fuck it’_ and go anyway. He remembers cold fingertips and dimples and he’s still so _greedy_ for it, for all of him.

But what if one of John’s withdrawal mood swings pop up? What if the cravings strike hard and fast? What if he scares Garrett?

_What if, what if, what if._

That’s what really scares John, isn’t it? That’s what is really making him hesitate.

If this was before his run in with drugs – or hell, even while he was high out of his mind – this wouldn’t be an issue; he’d just swan in and sweep Garrett off his feet. But then again, if this was before, or during, John wouldn’t even be out here. Probably wouldn’t have even cared to get to know Garrett.

But this is now, shaky hands and cravings for little white lines that gnaw away at his mind and all, finding himself genuinely caring about Garrett whereas before or during he knows he wouldn’t have, or at least not to the extent he does now.

Coming back from an overdose and addiction really puts things into perspective.

He goes left instead of right. 

Goes to the supply box instead of towards Garrett’s tower.

Maybe another time, when John isn’t feeling so… he doesn’t even know.

It doesn’t take him long to make it to the supply drop and opens up the green box that’s sectioned into three parts; Moss Peak, Twin Forks, Spruce. All three sections are still filled, so John must be the first one to even get here. It’s odd to see the names of the other lookouts; John knows of them, but he’s never wondered about them, never been curious to know who they are.

John has to take a moment to quiet his thoughts. It’s been difficult, ever since he came out here, to just… keep his thoughts from spiraling. Is it because of the isolation or the withdrawal? He honestly can’t tell.

Grabbing his box of supplies and putting it into his pack (he’s really not looking forward to hiking back with it weighing him down), John presses down on his radio’s call button.

“Alright, I got everything I need out of here.”

“Just yours, right?”

“Who do you think I am?” John asks with mock offence, but the sound of soft laughter from the other end ruins it, makes him smile with _fondness._

The laughter trails off, replaced by something more tentative in Garrett’s voice. “Hey, there’s… um, something I should probably tell you. I haven’t been honest about why I’m out here.”

“You do know that I don’t actually believe you’re out here because you’ve killed three men, right?”

Garrett snorts. “Yeah, no, if you actually believed that I’d have to seriously question your judgement. But I haven’t been honest. Lying by omission and all that.”

“What brought this on?” John asks as he hikes back the way he came.

“Just… I feel like I’m doing you a disservice by not telling you. I mean, feel free to tell me to keep it to myself and I will, but I’m tired of keeping it to myself just because I’m afraid you’ll think differently of me because of it.”

That stops John in his tracks and he turns to look back at Thorofare tower, as if he could see Garrett up there from this distance. “You can tell me.”

And he means it, he really does.

“I…” Garrett starts, then hesitates. “Actually, would it be okay if I come see you tomorrow and tell you then? I just—I feel like this is something I should say in person. Not over a radio.”

“Yes,” John says. “Of course you can come over tomorrow.”

“Thanks, John.”

\---

**Day Thirty-four**

The waiting is agony.

He knows it’ll take Garrett a while to hike out here, but still. Garrett’s coming out here to tell him something important and John is feeling impatient and slightly anxious. Even talking at Turt Reynolds doesn’t really help like it usually would, so he settles for sprawling out on his cot, staring at the ceiling while Turt rests on his chest, and tries not to stew in his emotional feedback loop.

John doesn’t know how long he’s been lying there, spacing out, but the sound of the door opening draws him back into the present.

“Knock, knock,” Garrett says, rapping his knuckles lightly on the doorframe. Sitting up on the cot, John swings his legs over the edge of it as he carefully puts Turt away in his enclosure. “Sleeping on the job? For shame.”

John rolls his eyes at him, but gets up and follows Garrett out, sits down next to him when he sinks down to the floorboards with his back pressed against the outside of the tower’s room. They sit in silence, Garrett wringing his hands until John reaches out and takes hold of one of them.

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. I won’t make you,” John assures him, but Garrett shakes his head.

“No, I want to. It’s just… it’s harder to say it in person and I have no idea where to start, really,” Garrett admits. “I could just jump right in and tell you what happened, but I don’t think it’d make a lot of sense without at least some context and I still hit the same problem. I don’t know where to start.”

John doesn’t really know where Garrett should begin either, if context would make any difference or not. So he waits, one hand still holding Garrett’s.

“So the reason why I’m out here is because of my best friend who has been like a brother to me since we were nine,” Garrett finally begins. “You know how I used to be a Deputy but quit because the department was crooked? Well, Billy – my best friend – stopped some asshole from spiking a girl’s drink at his bar and called the guy out in front of everyone, just publicly embarrassed him in front of a good portion of the town. After that, Billy winds up dead a day later, all because some _jackass_ couldn’t handle having his pride wounded. It was obvious who did it, but Sheriff Webber said to leave it alone, there wasn’t any evidence.”

Garrett pauses and John interlaces their fingers.

“I went digging and there was _plenty_ of evidence; the guy didn’t even bother to hide it because he’d already bought off most of the department. One of those old money types where fines are just a price tag to do something. I knew the department was corrupted, but I’d been trying for a year to get them change their ways without getting them into trouble. All bright eyed and bushy tailed and fresh out of college; I was too stubborn to see that they wouldn’t change. It didn’t really hit me until I confronted the Sheriff. I tried bringing it to the DA, but I had the door slammed in my face so many times that I just… I gave up. I quit the Sheriff’s department and ran away from it.” There are tears and Garrett’s voice is wavering and John pulls Garrett into a hug because… because it’s the right thing to do. Because he cares about him.

_(“Look at you growing up.” John can practically hear Rachel saying with a smirk on her face. “You really do have a heart under all those layers of coke.”)_

“I took the coward’s way out and I can’t even face my family anymore because of it. And I can’t help but think that maybe if I kept _trying—”_

“If you had,” John cuts him off, “you’d either have lost your mind just repeatedly hitting a wall with the DA, or they would’ve gotten tired of you meddling and done something about it.”

He’s dealt with enough cases against corrupted law enforcement. John knows full well that Garrett could’ve easily ended up like Billy did.

Garrett falls quiet and buries his face against John’s shoulder, his arms coming up to wrap around John too. John’s shirt is beginning to soak through with tears, but he keeps that piece of information to himself. There’s no need to bring it up.

“I’m surprised you didn’t shoot the Sheriff,” John says, a smile worming its way onto his face at Garrett’s choked laughter.

“Believe me, I wanted to,” Garrett admits, then more quietly, “Thank you. For listening.”

“Of course. And I don’t think you’re a coward. At least you _tried,_ which is more than anyone who’s silence wasn’t bought can say.”

Garrett pulls back enough to look John in the eye, and there’s a soft, tiny smile on his face and John can feel his heart constrict and then they’re both leaning in and then…

And then John says, “I OD’d.”

And then Garrett pulls back again, but not completely away.

“What?” There’s confusion and wow, John really could’ve gone about this better instead of just blurting it out. He doesn’t even know why he said it.

“Why I’m out here. I, uh, had a lot of issues – still do, actually, but I’ve been working on them. But I wasn’t before. I didn’t deal with it in a good way; I used cocaine to cope and it… it didn’t end great. Scared my brothers and my niece when my habit finally landed me in the hospital; I don’t really remember how I even got there. I promised them I’d clean myself up and do better, so I went to rehab and then came here,” John admits in a cascade of word vomit.

He hadn’t realized he closed his eyes until he feels something bump against his head and John swallows thickly at the return of that soft smile. “Thanks for telling me. You didn’t have to, but I appreciate it.”

John swallows again. “I wanted to.”

And it’s true; he’s wanted to tell Garrett for a while now he just… didn’t know how to. Apparently all he had to do was say it.

\---

**Day Sixty-four**

“You’ve got a front row seat for what might be the biggest fire of the year,” Garrett informs John over the radio as he watches a part of the forest light up in an orange glow, bright against the dark night sky. 

“Yeah, it’s really going.”

There’s a sigh from the other end of the radio.

“I’m going to call it in. They’ll send in a hotshot crew for some suppression, but I bet we’ll be stuck with her for the rest of the summer.” John leans against the railing, listening to Garrett talk. “And, she doesn’t have a name yet. I usually think of something funny, or something practical or a little risqué when coming up with them. You wanna do the honors?”

John’s mouth twitches as he remembers a conversation they had had, all the way back on John’s second day out here. “How about ‘The Flapjack Fire’? Can you sell that as a name?”

“You really like that, huh?”

“It’s grown on me.”

“Fair enough. Flapjack Fire it is,” Garrett chuckles, though John can tell he’s pleased about it. “They’ll probably ask me if it was a camp cooking accident or something. Y’know, as dangerous as they are, I love how they look at night. During the day it’s just smoke, but when the sun is down you can just… get lost.”

“Yeah,” John agrees quietly.

“I’m glad you’re here.”

“Me too. I just wish…” 

_(“That we weren’t in separate towers.”)_

_(“That you were right_ here, _watching this_ with _me.”)_

_(“That I kissed you when we had the chance.”)_

“I know. I do too. We could sit outside. We could talk without having to use the radios all the time.”

“I should’ve kissed you, the last time you were here,” John says, and there’s a pang of longing. Because now that there’s a fire there’s even less of a chance that Garrett will be able to sneak away from his lookout, or that John will even be able to go to him. Not until the fire either goes out or the summer comes to end. 

Whichever comes first.

“We still have time. There’s no rush,” Garrett tells him. “And if we aren’t able to meet again until the summer is over, come find me at the Spread Eagle in Falls End. You can kiss me then and buy me a beer as an apology for calling my shirt ugly.”

“It is.”

“I know.”

_(“I miss you.”)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kind of short, but the next three days (76, 77, and 78) are ridiculously long and i'll probably have to break them up into at least two different chapters depending on how things go with writing them.
> 
> if y'all have any questions about this fic or any others i've written or if ya just wanna talk about fc5 u can find me [here](http://edmunderson.tumblr.com/)


	4. Chapter 4

**Day Seventy-six**

“You’re going fishing without a license?”

“It’s _one_ fish,” John explains as he double check the line of the fishing rod he’d found and tries to remember what Jacob had taught him and Joseph about cleaning and gutting back when they were kids. It had been a particularly rough time where they hadn’t been able to go home for an entire week and Jacob couldn’t risk sneaking back in or stealing food from the neighbors. “And I’m sick of all the stuff I’ve got to eat.”

“Well, I won’t tell anyone that you’re a poacher,” Garrett promises. “Oh, that reminds me, I keep hearing reports from Fish & Game about a problem bear they’re trying to keep tabs on, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it turns out that it’s just Cheeseburger escaping the F.A.N.G. Center again. Can you search around the lake for fresh tracks and just let me know what you find? There was a crew burning fire lines out to the east and um, you know, I think sometimes it riles up the wildlife.”

 _“‘Problem bear?’_ Fuck that, I’m of the opinion that they are _all_ problems.”

“Come on, _please?”_

John sighs in defeat. He can’t believe how quickly he’s _caving_ to look for a _bear_ and _no,_ that is no way some bad joke because he refuses to stoop to Garrett’s level and he’s conveniently ignoring the fact that he named his turtle Turt Reynolds because it’s a dumb play on words that he knew Garrett would love.

“I can’t believe I’m going to leave this planet as a pile of bear shit,” John grumbles, but finds himself not being all that bothered when he can practically hear Garrett’s smile.

“Thank you, John,” Garrett says and John can picture the dimples that go with it.

“Yeah, yeah,” John replies and continues following the trail to the lake.

The Flapjack Fire is still burning away, deeper in the forest, but it’s been contained for the most part. A part of him wants to ask Garrett to come meet him at the lake, but as long as the fire is going all lookouts are to stay in their assigned areas unless told otherwise.

It doesn’t take him long to reach the lake’s shore and it’s actually nice out here when he isn’t picking up after drunks. As he approaches the water’s edge, something catches his eye; a clipboard.

Sighing, John heads over to pick it up.

Looks like it’s not just drunks he’s having to pick up after.

But once he’s picked up, he takes a closer look at it and…

“What the…?”

Someone’s been listening in on and writing down the conversations between him and Garrett and that’s… That’s so creepy it sends actual _shivers_ down his spine and the hairs at the back of his neck stand on end when he gets to the part where someone has been _clearly_ following him, because there are notes on how many times he comes down to the lake or how early he wakes up.

“Uh, Garrett,” John says shakily into the radio, any plans of fishing long forgotten at this creepy turn of events. “I found a clipboard down here and, I—there’s something strange going on.”

“At the lake? What’s up?”

“Someone’s been writing down what we’ve been saying to each other,” John tells him as he looks at the top of the clipboard where it says _‘Property of Wapiti Station.’_

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

_“‘What’s up? Sasquatch come by to welcome you to the neighborhood?’”_

“No way,” is Garrett’s stunned reply, but before John can answer, he gets the feeling he’s being watched.

“Wait. Hold on. Something’s out here.”

He’s not sure if he wants it to be the bear or the weirdo who has been watching eavesdropping for _weeks._

“John? I’m worried.” 

“Me too,” he answers honestly and heads towards the canyon.

He’s barely over the log being used as a bridge when he finds a red radio that has seen better days; it’s still on and crackles a bit with feedback; whoever left the clipboard must’ve left in a hurry.

John presses down on the call button on his own radio to report what he’s found to Garrett, but then he hears a stick snapping and something hits the back of his head hard and fast. He crumples to the ground and when he tries to look at his attacker he’s hit again and everything goes dark.

\---

“—re you there? John?” His head is ringing and Garrett’s voice sounds warped and far away, nervous and concerned. “C’mon, buckaroo, this isn’t funny. Oh god, why did I call you that? Please answer me, John.”

He spits dirt out of his mouth as he pushes himself up onto wobbling legs and the whole world tilts so much that he has to use a nearby boulder to lean against. “Got hit in the head. Punched or something by someone.”

“Are you serious? What the hell is going on out there?”

“I’d like to know too, because isn’t exactly what I thought they meant by _‘Enjoy the great outdoors.’”_

“Okay, so, you found a clipboard with transcripts of our conversations? What else is on it?”

“I don’t know; it’s gone along with a radio of theirs I found.” A thought comes to him. “What’s Wapiti Station? I saw it on the clipboard before I got hit. Does it mean anything to you?”

“I don’t—maybe it’s Wapiti Meadow?” Garrett still sounds concerned but John is honestly _pissed_ now at whoever just knocked his lights out. _(“Reel that temper in, Johnny.”)_ “It’s on our maps; it shouldn’t be too far from where you are now. It’s where you saw that fence. There should be a trail somewhere on the north shore of the lake.”

“Thanks, I’ll start hiking that way now.” John pushes away from the boulder and winces when his head throbs something terrible. “Goddamn, my head…”

“Are you—Are you sure you saw what you saw, John? Maybe you pissed off some more campers and they came back to sucker punch you.”

“Should I be offended that you sound hopeful about that?” John asks as he heads back towards the lake’s shore and follows it, trying to find the trail. “Besides, I know what I saw. It was our words, with initials for our names – J and G, clear as day.”

“No, it’s just—I don’t like the idea of someone out there who’s been paying far too much attention to us _assaulting_ you and you going after them by yourself.” Garrett sighs. “And for the record, I _do_ believe you. God, this is such an invasion of privacy. I don’t think I’ll ever be comfortable talking over a radio again.”

“Someone is out here with a walkie talkie taking notes and talking to God knows who.” Following the trail leads him to a long drop off, but there’s a rock with another carabiner secured around it (he wants to ask who keeps leaving these everywhere, but then realizes it’s probably the Forest Service), so he attaches his rope to it and starts descending. “What do you think is going on behind that fence?”

“Uh, apparently a lot of following you around and taking notes. Which is un-fucking-believable, John.”

“You’re telling me. Alright, I’m on my way to Wapiti Meadow; I’ll let you know what I find.”

“Okay. There’s got to be a reasonable explanation. Either way, be careful.”

It honestly doesn’t take him that long to get to the fence; he remembers it taking much longer to get to it the first time he found it, but then again he’d probably taken the long way around the first time.

“Okay, I’m at the fence and I don’t see anyone around, but I’m not sure I can get past it and it goes on for acres in both directions.”

“What the _fuck_ is going on out there?”

John looks at one of the green ‘No Trespassing’ signs. “Whatever it is, someone doesn’t want anyone to know about it.”

“Sometimes biologists will cordon off a little area to study flora or whatever, but that’s only a few square feet, usually.”

“Yeah, that’s definitely not what this is.” It’s chain-link, so maybe he can climb over? “It looks like Area 51 out here.”

There’s a huff of faint laughter. “Maybe they’ve got aliens. That’d be exciting. Definitely better than being followed by some creep.”

“Let’s hope so.”

Maybe he should try looking for a gate first before he tries climbing instead. He goes left first, walking along the fence and doesn’t find much except for a random stack of rocks on top of a boulder. Going a little further reveals a locked gate.

“And the gate is locked up, obviously.”

“Obviously.”

“I’ll see if I can break in or something.”

John picks up a small broken off branch and tries to use it to pry open the gate, but it just splinters and snaps in half. He goes back to the stack of rocks, grabs one, and tries to use it to break off the lock.

No dice.

“Looks like I’m not going to get in.”

“Shit.”

“I don’t know how long I can mess around out here until someone notices. And I’d try climbing over it, but I don’t like having a locked gate behind me if I need to beat a hasty retreat.”

“If you were an actual fireman you’d have that gate down in two shakes.” Garrett makes a thoughtful noise. “Hey, actually – those guys doing the controlled burn. They might be able to help.”

“Where are they?”

“Beyond Ruby River – there’s a scout camp. They burned a line a few days ago that should let you hike right to them,” Garrett tells him while John pulls out his map, trying to find Ruby River. “If they haven’t left yet they’re probably the type of guys who would help you get through that fence.”

John finds it on the bottom right of the map; looks like the easiest way to get to it is to head back towards his watchtower.

So he heads back the way he came and decides to take the path through the canyon since it’ll take less time. He’s about halfway through when Garrett calls again.

“Hey, so I called around to the other lookouts and things seem normal with everyone else.”

“Has anything been strange on your end?” John’s angry enough with this guy for ambushing him, but if this guy gets any ideas about trying that on Garrett, well… John won’t be held responsible for his actions.

“No, nothing really.”

“Nothing really, or nothing?”

“Nothing,” Garrett clarifies and relief washes through John until Garrett continues. “My door was open the other night, but that’s not strange.”

“That doesn’t sound like nothing.”

“It’s _nothing._ I promise.”

_(“Watch your temper, John.”)_

Taking a deep breath, John decides to let it go; if Garrett says it’s nothing then it’s nothing. He turns into the cave and heads for the climbing wall. “Alright, I’m headed towards the camp, anyway.”

“Okay, keep your radio close to you.”

He pauses on the trail that leads up to his tower, and looks at the spot where he remembers seeing the guy with the flashlight, all those weeks ago. He wonders if it was the same guy as the one who attacked him at the lake.

“I know we don’t know what’s going on yet, but… I don’t have a good feeling about it. I don’t like feeling vulnerable. It’s not like you can just call the police and it’s not like they’d really do anything out here anyway.” 

“What brought this on?” John asks as he climbs up the rocky ledge and he’s _finally_ back at his tower, though that means he’s only about halfway to the camp now.

“You mean other than you being attacked?” Garrett sighs. “I was just thinking about the Goodwins. It just struck me that if anything weird like this happened to them, happened to Brian… just how scared he would’ve been.”

And John can understand that. If something like this happened to Faith – his niece – he’d be upset too. But it’s not happening to her or to Brian; they’re both safe with their dads which is more than John can say about his own father or Mr. Duncan.

“He had his dad to protect him. Ned, right?” John stops briefly by the stairs of his tower, taking a quick breather; his head still throbs dully every now and then, but it doesn’t really hurt anymore.

“Yeah,” Garrett concedes, but he doesn’t sound like he fully believes it.

“What, you don’t think he could?”

“No, you’re probably right.”

“It was three years ago. He’s in high school now. He’s on summer break,” John says, trying to reassure him.

“Yeah, you’re right. You’re right.”

John looks up at where the sky meets the tops of the trees and sees the smoke. 

“The Flapjack Fire really isn’t going anywhere, huh?” John asks as he starts walking again, figuring he’s taken a long enough break.

“No. That’s why those guys came out to burn that line. It’s at the stage where all we can really do is pay attention to it,” Garrett explains.

“They’re not going to try to put it out?”

“Not yet, apparently.”

Huh.

John follows the trail until it forks and takes the one on the left that slopes down and away towards the river.

It’s surprisingly shallow at the point he crosses, the water barely even coming up to his ankle as he walks through it and he decides to open up the supply cache that’s there. On the underside of the box’s lid is _‘Lending Library’_ written next to another note, but in the box itself are a couple of rolls of toilet paper, a few books (Terminal Seven, The Accidental Savior, A Chance to Die, and Jane Eyre), and more pine cones.

John puts the copy of Jane Eyre into his bag before closing the supply box back up.

It doesn’t take him long to find the scorched earth.

“I found where they did the controlled burn,” John reports.

“Normally they wouldn’t do that so close to a body of water, but I think they’re extra-worried about a fire jumping the river and burning up to Two Forks now that there’s someone in it.”

“Well I’m extra-appreciative of that,” John replies as he follows the burnt trees and scorch marks to a large, open clearing.

“Let’s see… the scout camp is southeast of the river. There should be a pond on the way.”

“Got it.” A thought strikes him as he continues hiking through the clearing and spots another burn spot. “What happens if a controlled burn gets out of control?”

“Someone gets fired.”

John groans. “Ugh, are you serious?”

“That one was an honest accident. And I’m not even really in the mood for word play right now. That’s how wound up all this shit has me.”

Not far from the burn spot John sees the pond and a… a snowmobile? 

“Why are there snowmobiles out here?” John asks when he gets a closer look and finds out that there _multiple_ crashed snowmobiles just left out here.

“Really?”

“Looks like someone was cruising across the pond and dumped it.”

“That probably wasn’t a fun hike back to civilization.”

There’s something weird about these snowmobiles, other than the fact that they’re abandoned. John notices the engines are completely missing. “Someone stripped these snowmobiles down to the bone. That’s weird right?”

“I mean, I can come up with a bunch of not-weird reasons someone would do that out here, but given what’s happened, yeah that’s weird,” Garrett answers while John moves over to the pond to get a better look at half-submerged snowmobile.

John goes back to looking for the camp, but he must’ve gotten turned around at some point, because he finds himself at the huge, bare tree that has one single ski leaning against it at the top of a small hill. Against the pale yellow of the afternoon sky, it actually looks pretty, especially with the flakes of ash drifting through breeze, giving it a surreal sort of quality to it; he wonders if he’ll be able to show this place to Garrett at some point. 

John thinks he’d like it.

He pulls out the disposable camera and takes a couple of shots (he hasn’t used it as much as he thought he would, and there’s a lot he should’ve taken photos of) before pulling out his map and trying to figure out where he got turned around.

John looks at the tree once more before going back to look for the camp.

\---

He finds the entrance to the scout camp, but the bridge is broken and he’d rather not try jumping a ravine that deep and wide.

“Camp Arapahoe.”

“You’re there?” Garrett asks.

“Yeah, but the bridge to the camp is out,” John says into the radio. “I’m going to walk the ravine and see if I can find some high-ground to get across.”

“Good plan. You know that camp has been out there since the fifties?”

“I was never that into the idea of scouts,” John admits as he starts walking along the ravine to find a way down and notices the broken bridge at the bottom. Apparently the rest of it has fallen into the ravine and it looks like it’s been down here a while, so the firefighters must’ve found another way across. “Something about men organizing boys around their ideals has never sat well with me.”

“Beware Webelos in large numbers.”

“Beware of anyone in large numbers.”

There’s a large rock formation on this side of the ravine that hangs over the other side, so John doesn’t have to deal with the ravine at all when he drops down. He takes a left at the totem pole, its paint and carving details faded from weather and time, and comes across three cabins in poor condition that form a half-circle around an old fire pit.

“You ever talk to anyone having to do with the scouts?”

“Nah, they haven’t been out here in a while. And I generally don’t have a lot to say to pre-teens.”

“Unless it’s Brian Goodwin,” John points out.

“Well, if forced I can make conversation with anyone. Plus it was sorta fun to hear about all of his nerdy hobbies.”

“He wasn’t scout material, I take it?” John asks.

“I got the sense the kid could barely tie his shoes much less a clove hitch. Good kid, just not the outdoorsy type.”

“What the hell is a clove hitch?”

“Well, it’s a knot you are probably too old and too stubborn to learn. You use it to make rafts and shelters and stuff like that,” Garrett informs him.

“You know how to make one?”

“Heck no, I’d make a Webelo do it.”

John lets out a huff of amusement and takes a closer look at the cabins; the one on the far left seems to be the only one in somewhat decent condition, the one in the middle’s bunkbeds are smashed and there’s—

“Any particular reason why there are bear traps in the scout shelters?”

“Scouts are stalwart prey.”

“That’s messed up, Garrett.”

A fluttering piece of paper tacked to the wall catches his attention. It’s another Missing Persons flier for Mitch Michaels; John guesses that there’s still someone out there looking for the guy, though at this point – 37 years later – John doesn’t think it’s likely the guy will be found. Hell, Mitch Michaels has been missing longer than John’s been alive.

John moves on from the cabins, goes down the path that leads away from them, and lo and behold, he’s found the firefighters’ camp.

“Yeah these guys are gone. I found where they were sitting around before getting picked up,” he tells Garrett before taking the fire-axe that had been left behind in a tree.

“Damn. Did they leave anything behind?”

“Just an axe.” John finds a piece of paper held down by a stone on one of the stumps used as chairs. “And a note from their boss.”

“What’s it say?”

“Next few days… dropping in the Thorofare… on behalf of Dr. Simmons at—Wapiti Station.”

“Wapiti Station.”

“Holy crap.”

“Don’t stop now!”

“Oh, I just thought I would maybe stop there. Let the mystery percolate.”

Garrett groans. “My mom always said I’d meet someone who’d give me a taste of my own medicine.”

John rolls his eyes at him even though Garrett can’t see it. “They’re running a research site out there. He was worried about wildfires.”

“Someone is writing down our conversations. And now we find out there’s a research site out here that we don’t know about? What are they researching?”

John’s got a few ideas about what they could be researching, but he’d rather not say them and risk sounding paranoid. And since there’s nothing else left of note here, so John heads to the other side of the firefighters’ camp and uses the axe to cut away some gnarled, thorny brambles to clear a path.

“Oh, you know, probably just horned toads.”

“Maybe Turt was an escapee,” Garrett says dryly. “And a Wapiti Station clipboard with our conversations on it is just, what, recreation for them?”

“Garrett, I’m joking. Somebody is obviously up to something. I might sound calm but I’m actually freaking out here. Just on the inside.”

The sound of Garrett’s soft laughter is soothing, makes the whole situation feel less serious than it might be. “At least we know there is something real happening behind that fence.”

“I think that we should at least consider that – maybe – this is all just a coincidence, but my gut says there’s something bad going on,” John says before he starts cutting down one of the dead trees by the ravine to use to get back to the other side.

“Mine too,” Garrett agrees quietly. “So what’s next?”

“Well, the firefighters left behind an axe, and I’m using it to get over the ravine and back towards the site.” He steps back when the tree begins to sway and watches it fall over, making a bridge for him to use.

“Sounds good. Check in when you can. And keep an eye out for anyone following you.”

\---

It’s quiet until John is almost back to the river.

“Are you there?” Garrett asks. “I had a thought.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“You heard someone in the bushes.”

“Yeah…”

“Okay, so let’s assume we’re being tailed. Or you are at least,” Garrett amends. “Where are you right now?”

“Just on my way back. In and out of trees, in the middle of nowhere.”

“Do you see anybody?”

John looks around him but sees no one, just trees and the scorch marks from the controlled burn and the river. “No, definitely not.”

“Alright, so tell me what you think of this—”

Whatever Garrett was about to say gets interrupted by static, and then the sound of someone coughing and something metal hitting a hard surface, before it cuts back to static and then silence.

“Did you just cough?” Garrett asks.

“No, did you just cough?”

“No.”

But they both already knew that it wasn’t either of them.

“There isn’t any way someone, like another lookout, could be on this line, is there?” John asks as he crosses the river, though he’s pretty sure he already knows the answer to that too.

“No. Not without tapping our radios.” There’s a brief moment of silence before Garrett speaks again. “Get in your tower. Shut the door. Don’t leave and don’t use your radio. I’ll call you. Understand. _I_ will call _you.”_

John does as he’s told and tries not to think about Wapiti Station or the person who had been by the lake. He puts his chair against the door, underneath the door handle, and keeps the axe close at hand. He tries to read the copy of Jane Eyre he got from the supply box, but he can’t focus on it long enough to get very far.

He can’t focus on much of anything, because John is worried about what the hell is going on, but more than anything he’s worried about Garrett and the fact that Garrett found his tower door open last night.

John doesn’t sleep well that night and for once it isn’t because of withdrawal cravings or nightmares, though he thinks that for once, he’d prefer either of those to this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> asfghdjkl i accidentally posted this chapter to the wrong fic the first time but it's fixed now (or at least it should be)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> monsoon season has finally kicked in so updating my other fics will probably happen even more irregularly, just a heads up

**Day Seventy-seven**

The smoke from the Flapjack Fire has gotten thicker, taking up most of John’s view of the north; he briefly wonders how large the fire has to get before evacuation becomes necessary.

If he’s being honest, as much as he’s come to like the Whitetails he’d really like to leave, since yesterday’s shocking revelation that his and Garrett’s conversations have been monitored and written down.

And quite frankly, John feels like he’s going out of his mind as presses down on the radio’s call button again. He knows Garrett said to wait for him to call first, but it’s already past noon with no word.

“Thorofare tower, this is Two Forks, calling you for the, oh, fiftieth time today.” No answer. 

“The Flapjack Fire continues to move in a southerly fashion.” 

Still no answer.

Thumb and forefinger pinching the bridge of his nose, John speaks into his radio once more. “Garrett, for fuck’s sake, answer your radio.”

“Hello, sunshine!” Garrett finally answers, sounding far too chipper for their situation. “Sorry, I went out for a bit. What can I do for you?”

“I didn’t sleep a wink last night and I’ve been going crazy for the past few hours. How are you so chipper?”

“Well it’s a new day. What a day, this day we’ve been given!”

He blinks once, twice, reflects on his life choices that have led him to very moment. “Maybe I am actually still asleep right now. Maybe I didn’t stay up all night knowing that someone is—”

“I actually slept just great!”

Garrett sounds… odd.

“Uh, okay?”

“By the way, I was wondering if your Flora of the Whitetails info poster was still up inside your tower?” Garrett asks and _what?_

“…What?” John asks, completely bewildered.

“It’s just protocol that those stay up, y’know, info about your tower, the surrounding tree species, etc.”

“Alright?” He has no idea where Garrett is going with this.

Garrett sighs in exasperation. “Just, you know, have a look at it. Make sure it’s in ship-shape.

Frowning down at the radio, and then out the window towards Thorofare, John moves over to the poster above Turt’s enclosure. It’s still up, like it has been the entire time he’s been here.

“Yeah, it’s up. Are you okay? You’re acting weird.”

“Great! That’s perfect. Do you see the tree in the top row, second from the left?”

He takes a look; it’s a cottonwood tree, though he doesn’t see how that’s relevant to any of this, to anything going on.

“It’s—”

But Garrett cuts him off. _“No._ You don’t need to tell me. Just, uh… remember it. There’s an area in your sector named after that tree that you should hike out to. Maybe. It’s really nice there.”

It’s obviously really important to Garrett that he goes there and John figures he should. “Sure, I could go for a hike right now.”

“Nothing like an afternoon in the mountains,” Garrett comments and then very pointedly says, “Radio me as soon as you get there.”

Grabbing his pack and taking a look at his map, John finds that the big dead tree he had stumbled across yesterday.

\---

“I’m here,” John reports. The place is still as pretty as it had been yesterday, dead tree and all.

“You see the cache box?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Open it. I changed the code. It’s ‘5-6-7-8.’”

“Keeping to the theme, I see,” John replies wryly.

“I was in a rush!”

John rolls his eyes, but a fond smile quirks at the corner of his mouth. Putting in the new code reveals a new radio left inside the cache box. He takes it, and leaves his old one in its place.

“You know, you could’ve just given this to me in person if you were going to come all the way out here,” John says into the radio. Garrett’s odd behavior from earlier finally making sense.

“Believe me, I would’ve liked to, but then I’d have a hard time leaving,” Garrett admits and the longing intensifies for a moment. Now’s not the time or place, but at the end of the summer or whenever Flapjack burns too much, and buying Garrett a drink at some bar called the Spread Eagle. John can wait, despite how much he doesn’t want to; he’s been learning patience. “I lied to two rangers to get it, but now you have an untapped radio.”

“Well, maybe now we can get some answers. I’m done with sitting around,” John says and heads for the fence.

\---

“Hey, so, I just remembered something not good.”

“What is it?” John asks as climbs down into the cave that leads to the canyon.

“I filed a report that said neither of us ever talked to or saw those girls who went missing a few weeks ago.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Because the law out here is crooked as hell and I didn’t want them messing with you? Look, the point is, is that what if your radio had been bugged before you even got here? What if it had been bugged when you had that run in with them?”

The realization hits John like a semi-truck.

“Oh. Oh no.”

“Oh yes.”

“And now someone probably has a transcript of that conversation,” John says and normally he wouldn’t be worried – he’s a lawyer, and a damn good one too – but with the whole _‘someone has been listening in on them’_ thing he kind of feels a little too far out of his depth.

“And I’ve falsified a report. Like, just one big, huge lie.”

“And those girls are still missing.”

“This has turned into a real shit show, huh?”

\---

It isn’t until after he’s pried open the gate with his axe that John wonders if maybe he should’ve just climbed instead, even if he wasn’t all that wild about it.

“I broke the gate. Should I just leave it or…?”

“Nah, screw it.”

John decides to go with it; he really doesn’t have the time to worry about the gate anyway with how quick the sun is going down.

It takes him a while, just wandering the sectioned off part of the forest, trying to find something, _anything,_ and he comes across a monitoring tower with a bright red light at the top of it.

“Okay, I’m at the site. I don’t see anyone around.”

“That’s… surprisingly lucky for us.”

“There’s some serious looking communication equipment here too. All wireless,” John reports as he continues to look around. “It’s also positioned in a way that no one from the lookout towers can see it and that’s an accomplishment considering how hard to miss this tower is.”

“What the _fuck._

John wholeheartedly agrees with that.

A few yards away, John finds another tower, a tent, and a whole lot of noisy machinery. He reports everything as he finds it.

“The inside of the tent looks trashed,” John says as walks through it. “It’s definitely a monitoring station and all their stuff is still here.”

“They probably know you’re there or something. See what you can find.”

He goes over to the desk that is covered in papers, the chair overturned as if someone left in a hurry. “The desk in here is a mess, though it looks like a lot of it was knocked over on accident. And there’s some sort of monitor, but I wouldn’t be able to tell you what it does.”

“This is so creepy.”

“Well it’s about to get even creepier,” John tells him, picking up a clipboard that seems to be tracking their behavior as well as two others’. “They’ve got a log here tracking the movement of four subjects.”

“You and me? Wait, you said four. So who are the other two?”

“Honestly? I have no clue. It could be anyone. Maybe the missing girls or the other two lookouts, but they just haven’t noticed anything?”

“Anything’s possible,” Garrett concedes. “Find anything else?”

“Yeah, they’ve got a map here with a lot of different areas and paths marked on it.” John takes a closer look at it and feels a chill crawl up his spine. “There’s a few that look like the paths I normally take.”

“You sure it’s you?” Garrett asks.

“I don’t know, but I’m really hoping it’s not.”

He steps away from the desk and notices a bulky container in the corner and goes to open it. It’s labeled as _‘Wave Receiver’_ and it’s all painting an unsavory picture, but John takes it anyway and flips it on. It begins to beep, either more or less depending on his direction.

It’s beeps the most towards the northeast, and he follows it back into the tent, towards the desk. John clears away the papers and finds a small black box with a glowing green light that sits upon a binder labeled _Subjects: John S., Garrett R._ Flipping it open, John finds observation reports.

“Are you shitting me?”

“What? What is it?”

“There’s a binder of reports here. They’re assessments. About the two of us. Hell, there are even things I haven’t told you in here…”

Garrett lets out a frustrated sigh. “I’d say we should burn the place down, but that’s probably not a good idea for a lot of reasons.”

“Yeah. And who knows? Maybe that’s what they want us to do? Maybe they’re trying to push us to the point we do something crazy. The grass is dry here. It would go up in a second.”

“Ugh, I just—I’m _pissed._ This is messed up and you’re out there on your own and…”

“Hey, it’s alright,” John says as he tears out the reports on the two of them. “I’m going to head back to my tower and I’ll bring the wave receiver with me. We can figure out where to go from here tomorrow.”

“Okay. Be careful.”

“I will,” John promises and start heading back towards the fence.

He doesn’t feel any better about this; he thought if they got answers about what the hell is going on that things would get better, but if anything it’s made their situation more… real, he guesses. Garrett’s stressed out and John… John thinks he would’ve preferred it if he could’ve just chalked this up to the withdrawal process.

After he jumps the gap, John notices a column of smoke, far too close to be the Flapjack Fire.

Garrett radios him before he can call Garrett first.

“Hey, I don’t want to assume you did something, but… why is there smoke coming from Wapiti?”

“It wasn’t me,” John says. He gets a good look at how quick it’s spreading and starts heading back towards his tower again. “Call it in.”

“This just keeps getting worse. What the hell do we do?”

“I don’t know. I really fucking don’t.”

“Except get the hell out of here,” Garrett says.

“Please.”

“I will.”

\---

There’s a beeping sound when John is almost back to his tower.

It takes him a moment to remember he took the wave receiver.

He takes it out of his pack and sets off in the direction it tells him too; it’s probably not a good idea to be wandering around the forest at night like this, but then again there haven’t been a lot of good ideas lately.

The wave receiver leads him to some bushes not far from the medicine wheel and in the bushes he finds a strange backpack. As soon as he picks it up there’s a shrill, blaring alarm that makes him jump.

Cursing under his breath, John kicks it until it falls silent.

This was supposed to be an easy, relaxing job for the summer. What he got instead was something out of a conspiracy theorist’s wet dream and loud annoying noises.

Turning his attention back to the bag, he finds a key clipped to it.

 _Cave 452_ is written on the red keychain.

He vaguely remembers Garrett saying that Nancy had lost the key a few years ago, so what the hell is it doing out here? A quick look inside the bag reveals nothing of interest, so John leaves it where he found it.

“Hey Garrett, I found a bag that was attached to an alarm. There wasn’t anything in it other than basics, but there was a key attached to it. It says it’s for Cave 452. That’s the one in the canyon, right?”

“Yeah, but who took them?”

“And what’s in that cave? Obviously something important enough to steal the key to it.”

“I dunno, but I see that you’re back at your tower, so maybe leave the cave adventure for tomorrow?”

There’s ice in his veins and John swears his heart stops for a moment. “I’m not in my tower, Garrett.”

“I’m looking at a man in your tower and it isn’t you?”

“It really isn’t. I’m out by the medicine wheel.”

“Holy shit,” Garrett breathes. “Go.”

\---

“Whoever it was is gone,” John tells Garrett when he makes it back to his lookout.

“But he was _just_ there!”

There’s something taped to the door. A _Walkman_ of all things. Good lord, John doesn’t think he’s seen one of these since he was a kid.

John takes it, puts the headphones on and listens.

And what he hears isn’t good.

The sound quality is bad, but he can hear Garrett’s voice and his own, but someone has edited the audio to make it sound like they caused the fire at Wapiti.

“Looks like my unexpected house guest left a terrible present.”

“What is it?”

John sighs, tossing the Walkman onto his desk. “Don’t freak out, but it’s a recording of our conversation and it’s been edited to sound like the fire at Wapiti was our fault. And that it was your idea.”

“God fucking damn it,” Garrett mutters. He sounds like he might cry and John can’t help but feel hopeless at their situation.

John spends most of the night watching the fire burning in the distance; if it’s the Flapjack or the Wapiti he honestly couldn’t say.

\---

**Day Seventy-eight**

John didn’t sleep again; he’s spent most of his time either watching the fires or listening to the tape over and over, trying to find something that would indicate that it had been edited. The audio cuts are too well done.

The smoke from the Flapjack has gotten thicker, the fire moving steadily further and further south.

“I think I’m going to be sick,” Garrett says. “Someone claiming to be John Seed called a lookout in another sector this morning and said I knew what started the Wapiti Meadow fire.”

“It’s going to be alright,” John says even though he doesn’t believe it. Shit just keeps getting thrown their way and things just get worse and worse.

“God, I really wish I could believe that,” Garrett says. “The lookout called me asking what I know, probably thinking I’m an arsonist or that I’ve gone off the deep end or something. At any rate, things aren’t looking good for us and I’d say it’s a good bet that he’s got a copy of the tape he left you. And I’m guessing it has something to do with that cave, something he doesn’t want us to find.”

“I’m going there now,” John tells him as he grabs his bag, putting the tape in there just in case the guy comes back to his tower.

Stepping out of his tower gets him a lungful of smoke; the fire has gotten worse, or maybe the two fires have merged at some point. Either way, he’s got to move quick, though he pauses at the drawings on the railing, left by Brian Goodwin, and pats them once before heading for the cave.

The smoke and the ash make the forest look grim and hostile, and when John sees the hill that the man with the flashlight had been standing on way back on his first day out here, John wonders if it’s the same guy, if that’s what started all of this.

“Hey, you—you didn’t actually make that call to the other lookout, right?” Garrett asks. “I just… I feel ridiculous for even thinking this, but I keep wondering if you lied to me.”

“I would never lie to you, Garrett. I don’t think I could, even if I wanted to and I _don’t._ This guy is just trying to turn us against each other, but that’s not going to happen because we’re going to stick together, right?”

“Yeah. Thank you, John.”

Down in the cave, it doesn’t take John long to find the gate; it sticks out like a sore thumb and he still gets that same sense of _wrong_ as soon as he looks at it.

For a moment, he’s worried that the key will break in the lock, but it does open and he steps through it. He’s only taken a few steps when he hears the hinges creak loudly and the loud clang of metal hitting metal. John goes back to check it out and finds the gate locked, and with the way the mesh is there’s no way he can reach his arm around to unlock it himself.

Fan-fucking-tastic.

“Garrett, someone’s locked me in.”

“They _what?”_

“Yeah, someone closed it behind me and I can’t reach my arm around to unlock, so it looks like I’m going to have to find another way out. Besides, I came here to find answers anyway.”

“This really shouldn’t be something you’re trying to find the bright side of, John.”

\---

There’s a steep drop, but John doesn’t want to take the chance when there’s a path that leads further in; he has to clear out some loose rocks, but he’d prefer taking this path than the other one.

It’s cold, practically freezing, and John wishes he had layered up before coming down here, though in his defense, it’s really hot outside due to the fires.

He follows the twists and turns until he finally finds an exit that leads out into a clearing he’s never been in before.

“Alright, so I’m no longer trapped in a cave, but I didn’t find anything.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Not yet, anyway. There was a steep drop, but I didn’t bring any climbing equipment with me, so I’m going to have to go back to Two Forks to look for something to use.”

“Because that doesn’t sound dangerous at all,” Garrett says dryly.

“I’m a regular Clutch Nixon, remember?”

“Clutch Nixon also went missing and is presumed dead.”

John rolls his eyes and starts looking for a path back to familiar territory when he finds what looks like a hideout. It reminds him of the tent that he and his brothers had made out of tarps and old blankets; a safe space to go to.

“Hey Garrett, I just found an outcropping that someone was using as a fort. I think it was Brian Goodwin.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, he built himself a real castle here. There’s drawings and… homework? It’s weird that he’d just leave so much of his stuff out here, right?” John asks, because he’s getting that feeling again, that feeling of _wrong._

“Well, they did leave abruptly. Maybe he didn’t have time to go back and get all of it? I mean, he wasn’t supposed to be out here in the first place.”

John hums in agreement, even though he’s still got that nagging in the back of his mind.

“They almost got busted,” Garrett explains. “Brian liked to go out on the railings of the lookout and wave at the planes that dump water on the fires. I got a call one day because someone thought a kid was up in Two Forks. I lied and just said it was Ned. If I ratted him out they would’ve been forced to leave and, I dunno. I know he wasn’t completely happy being out here, but I was worried about what kind of life Ned was going to bring him back too.”

And John can understand that; neither he nor Garrett came from happy homes. Sure, Garrett had found a new family in the Fairgraves, but it still didn’t change what he had gone through until then, what he had continued to go through until his dad had keeled over. And John… well, John went from one bad home to another and ended up with the Duncans.

He finds a bundle of pitons under a piece of plywood and a letter to a ranger with it.

“Huh. Brian stole his dad’s climbing gear. His anchors,” John says as he reads the letter.

“That’s convenient,” Garrett remarks.

“Yeah, it is. I think he was going to hide them in a cache box and never got around to it. He left a note for a ranger to find them and send them back to Nebraska.”

“Because he hated climbing.”

“It sounds like Ned was pushing him and pretending to lose his anchors was the easiest way to put a stop to it.”

“I hope it worked. What an _asshole.”_

“That’s the sort of thing that would’ve earned me a beating growing up.”

(More like Jacob would’ve tried to direct it at himself, doing his best to keep John and Joseph out harm’s way; it didn’t always work, but it meant everything to them that he tried anyway.)

“I wouldn’t put it past good ol’ Ned.”

\---

Since he found the pitons, John uses those to climb down the steep drop.

The sooner he finds out what’s down here, the better.

He walks a long way, even more twists and turns than the in previous passage he took, and there are a couple more long drops until it’s so dark he almost can’t see his hand in front of his face. So there must be a source of light in here somewhere.

John keeps going and he finds the light source – a large opening in the ceiling of the cave where the sunlight streams down and there’s…

“Oh, shit…” John breathes, moving closer. “Oh no...”

What he’s found down here, what was being kept hidden amongst broken climbing gear and loose rocks, is Brian Goodwin, nothing but skin pulled taut and limbs twisted at unnatural angles.

He feels like he’s just had the wind knocked out of him and he has to take a moment.

Should he… should he remove the body? No, no he needs to report it and—

Shit, he’s going to have to tell Garrett.

John takes another look, at the steep climb that Brian had apparently tried to make; that’s too much for a twelve year old kid to try, especially with how loose a lot of those rocks look.

“Ned Goodwin, you piece of shit,” John laughs, but it’s an awful thing, not even really a laugh; there’s too much… there’s just _too much_ in it to really be a laugh. “He didn’t even like climbing.”

Brian Goodwin didn’t even like climbing and he was left down here, alone in the cold, dark cave.

\---

John waits until he’s out of the cave before he calls Garrett.

“Hey, Garrett—”

“There you are! I’ve been worrying my ass off,” Garrett tells him and there’s so much _relief_ in his voice—

His voice catches in his throat; he doesn’t know what to say.

“You… you might want to take a seat.”

“What’s wrong?”

“The only thing in the cave was a body.” John pauses for a moment, trying to figure out the best way to tell Garrett exactly who it was. But there’s no good way to say the truth, is there? “It’s Brian Goodwin.”

There’s a few long moments of silence.

“How does that… What—I don’t— _How?”_ Garrett finally asks, his cracking and John really wishes he was there with him; this isn’t something that should be said over a radio.

“Climbing accident, I think. Or made to look like one. I think maybe Ned probably kept pressuring him to get into climbing and the rope just gave out on him.” John looks out towards Thorofare tower; it’s not anywhere near being in person, but it’s as good as they’re going to get at the moment. “I’m so sorry, Garrett.”

“He’d be alive if I had told someone he was out there,” Garrett says so quietly that John almost doesn’t catch it. “I don’t where he’d be, but I can assure you it wouldn’t be rotting at the bottom of a cave.”

“Garrett, there’s no way you could’ve known this would happen.”

“It doesn’t change that this is still my fault. I—I kept my mouth shut and Brian Goodwin died…” Garrett falls silent and John doesn’t say anything, just waits for him to find whatever words he’s looking for. “There’s nothing else to say. I think we’re leaving tomorrow, anyway.”

John thinks there’s a lot more to say, but he has no clue what it could be. He knows what he wants, and that’s for Garrett to grieve without blaming himself, but he doesn’t think that’s going to happen. Not any time soon anyway.

So John goes back to his tower, packs his things and watches the forest burn with Turt Reynolds moving around on his desk.

He keeps the radio close, but Garrett doesn’t call and John doesn’t call him either.

\---

**Day Seventy-nine**

The night was long and quiet.

They didn’t call each other and John tried to sleep, but couldn’t catch more than an hour or two at a time; nightmares plagued him the whole night through.

Nightmares of that cave, of Brian Goodwin dying down there alone in the dark.

In some of the nightmares, he thinks he hears a small voice crying for help, but it isn’t those damn raccoons from that campfire horror story Garrett had told him. No, in the dreams it’s Brian calling for help, but help never comes.

But even the light of day doesn’t wash those nightmares from his mind; the smoke is so thick he can barely see anything out the window. It’s like the night never left.

It’s like he’s still down in that cave.

John’s packing the last of his things when he hears the familiar sound of a plane flying overhead.

It’s also the first time Garrett has called him since John told him about who was down in the cave.

“You see that plane?”

“No, but I heard it,” John says.

“There’s going to be a lot more. The service says this fire is 2% contained. Seems like the two fires merged into one big disaster. You about packed up?”

Garrett sounds exhausted and drained and John has no clue what to do.

It’s one of the many things he never really learned growing up, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t try to be there for Garrett; he _wants_ to be there for him.

“Shouldn’t we talk? You know, about…”

“About what.”

“I don’t know, about everything that’s happened?”

Garrett sighs tiredly. “I don’t know what to say… it’s like the universe cooked up the cruelest thing to have happen. Does it connect to everything else? I don’t know. I don’t know if I even want to. What I do know is that Brian was a good kid and didn’t deserve what happened to him.”

John’s about to reply when there’s a beeping sound.

“Do you hear that?” Garrett asks.

“Yes. I’m going to follow it.”

“Make sure you pack up everything in case we get the call and you can’t get back to your tower. Don’t forget Turt either,” Garrett reminds him.

“As if I would forget Turt Reynolds.” John picks up Turt after he grabs his bag and the wave receiver. “If something happens…”

“I’ll remember you,” Garrett says.

“I was hoping you’d have a backup plan.”

“I’m probably moving to Canada. Ontario. Maybe.”

“No, I meant if something happens to me.”

“Right. If you don’t find out who made that tape and I have to hit the road.” There’s a teasing tone in Garrett’s voice; it’s faint, but it’s there and John’s glad to hear it.

John sighs in exasperation, but it’s mostly for show. Mostly. “Forget it.”

“Be safe, John,” Garrett says softly, sincerely, and then the radio falls silent.

(He stops one last time at the drawings on the railings, pats it one final time, both a goodbye and a promise; a promise that the kid won’t be forgotten, that he won’t be left down in the cave forever. That help will finally come for him once the fire has been dealt with.)

\---

It’s not just smoke in the air anymore, there’s a lot of dirt that’s being kicked up too, and John can barely see what’s in front of him.

Hell, he can barely even breathe without choking on the air.

He heads west for a long time; well, it probably just seems like a long time since it’s difficult to walk through this.

Garrett calls him again when the wave receiver’s beeping gets more frantic.

“How’s the search going?”

“Haven’t found it yet, but I’m close.”

“I just got the call. They’re coming to get us. My place. You remember the tram over the ravine? Looks like you finally get to use it.”

“I’ll try not to take too long.”

And then it’s just him and Turt again.

And they have to go down the Widowmaker. A small part of John wants to say forget it, because he doesn’t want to have a repeat of the first time he went down this shale slide. But he has to know, so he rappels down it.

Eventually, the wave receiver leads him to a rock with his name painted on it, with an arrow pointing up towards a rope with another cassette-tape and what looks like a tracking collar.

“Someone left a rope for me to climb. I’m down near the lake.”

“How do you know it’s for you?”

“There’s a tracking collar tied to it and there’s another tape. Also my name is written on the rock. Someone was leading me here.”

“Oh my god, John.”

He puts the new tape into the Walkman and listens to it as he starts climbing up the rope.

 _“Hi, John. You better find this before it burns up,”_ a tired sounding voice greets him. He assumes it’s Ned Goodwin. _“We’ve been causing each other a lotta headaches. Now I gotta go stake out a site that’s as fit for living as the one you’re about to find. You’ll get it when you see it.”_

He’s almost near the top now.

 _“You can’t blame me for keeping an eye on you. Not after bumping into you back in May. Down by the cave for fuck’s sake.”_ Actually he can blame him, because what the fuck. _“I’ve been up here for three years. I kept it cozy. Winters are harsh as hell, and I ran out of books. But I got an antennae rigged up—and Garrett… he’s a record you don’t gotta flip. I kinda get why Brian took to him. About a week ago I stopped worrying about you finding anything out and that’s right when everything went shit-house with you two.”_

He makes it to the top and follows a well-worn trail.

_“You guys don’t know anything about having kids, right? Nobody knows nothing. It ain’t Andy and Opie walking down to the lake to fish every afternoon. It ain’t Mayberry. But you gotta know I didn’t kill him, alright? We were climbing. I was teaching him. Brian was uneducated in the way to do anything. He just—he just fucking didn’t sink his anchor the right way. You know, I thought about going back, having to answer questions and having to get him put in the ground, and I didn’t see the point.”_

“So you just left him there?” John shouts angrily into wind whipping around him. He knows… he _knows_ Ned can’t hear him but _Jesus Christ._ John may not have any experience being a parent, but he knows Jacob, who had to be a parent for them at far too young of an age, would never have left them down there. He knows Joseph wouldn’t leave Faith down there.

And he knows that Ned Goodwin probably suffers from depression and PTSD, but what gives him the _right_ to think leaving his _son_ down there was okay in any way?

_“Don’t come looking for me; you won’t find me. And good luck. With Garrett.”_

Fuck, he has to tell Garrett about this.

John keeps following the trail and takes the radio from his belt, pushing down on the call button.

“Found the surveillance operation.”

“Okay. What does that mean? What is it?”

“It was Ned Goodwin,” John tells him. “He was the one listening to us. Just him.”

“Ned Goodwin. He made the tape?” Garrett asks as John finally comes across what remains of Ned’s camp; a pile of trash, some firewood, and a wooden hatch.

“Yeah. He’s gone. Deeper into the Whitetails. He doesn’t want anyone to know he’s out here.” John opens up the hatch. “Garrett—”

“Because he killed Brian. Because he killed his fucking _son.”_ He can hear Garrett’s voice crack. “You need to get over here. The helicopters are making the rounds.”

“I’m headed over now.” 

“Good, because I prefer you not being burnt to a crisp.”

From where he is, he can see that Ned left behind a lot of stuff. He hops down, just to take a quick look; on the wall next to the mattress there’s Wizards and Wyverns rulebook, a Father’s Day card, and what John assumes is a picture of Brian. After that, John decides he doesn’t need to poke around any further; he’s in no way thinking that just because the man kept a few of his son’s things suddenly means he’s good dad. He just… John doesn’t want to look at any of this anymore.

If Ned Goodwin wants to spend the rest of his life like this then fine.

But Brian deserved better.

John heads back into the storm, back into the smoke and ash.

\---

“I can’t stop thinking about it,” Garrett admits. “I can’t stop thinking about if I had just told the truth, then he’d still be alive.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“But it is. I had every chance to tell them that yes, there really was a kid at Two Forks, and I didn’t.” Then there’s the muffled sounds of a helicopter in the background. “Oh, fuck.”

“I’m assuming that’s the helicopter?”

“Yeah, hold on.” There’s a conversation that John can only half hear as he jogs through the canyon; Garrett hadn’t been kidding when he said that the fire was moving fast, the smoke is thicker now than it had been half an hour ago. “They’re here, but they’re making rounds. I think… I think I’m gonna go with them. I told them you’re still here so they’ll be back for you.”

John wants to ask him to stay, but he also wants him safe.

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea.”

“Yeah?” Garrett sounds hesitant, almost reluctant. That’ll have to be enough for now.

“Yes. Remember what we talked about? About meeting up at that bar and I’ll buy you a drink?”

There’s an amused, fond huff. “I remember.”

The radio clicks off and John is left with the quiet sounds of the forest burning in the distance.

\---

It’s a long and lonely ride across the ravine and John looks up at Thorofare tower the entire time.

A part of him wishes he had asked Garrett to stay.

Him as a whole wishes he had kissed Garrett when he had the chance, way back before the Flapjack Fire started.

John wishes for a lot of things.

\---

Standing at the bottom of the stairs that lead up to Garrett’s tower, John wonders if he should even bother going up there.

Garrett’s already gone, but who knows when the helicopter will come back.

John eventually decides to go up; might as well get out of the smoky air. He stops about halfway up and just… looks out over the forest; when it’s not up in flames the view must be amazing.

When he finally makes it to the top, he’s fully expecting it to be empty.

Instead, John finds Garrett leaning against the railing, watching the forest burn. Garrett looks at him, a soft smile on his face. “About time you showed up.”

“You stayed?” John finds himself asking.

“I know we agreed to meet at the Spread Eagle, and that you’d buy me a drink, but… I didn’t want to leave you here. It didn’t feel right to go without you.”

John has nothing to stay to that.

But he does go to Garrett and does what he should’ve done _weeks_ ago. Their kiss is slow and sweet, two things John isn’t used to at all and it feels right and like finally coming home and his fingers dig a little too hard into Garrett’s hips, but if anything it seems to only make Garrett press closer against him, makes him grip tighter where his hands are fisted in John’s shirt, keeping him as close as possible.

The kiss breaks but they don’t step away from each other. Even when the helicopter returns for them they’re still pressed closely into each other’s side, hands clasped and fingers laced together.

It feels odd to leave, but they cannot stay for many reasons.

John doesn’t know what happens now, where things go from here, but he’s willing to see what the future will bring with Garrett.


End file.
